Greenspan: Quantitative Easing Não Deu Certo.

Quem me conhece como economista sabe que eu tenho falado há pelo menos dois anos que o tal "quantitative easing" não funciona para quem precisa, serve muito mais para enriquecer quem já é rico.

É o que diz agora de forma mais polida o ex-presidente do Fed, Alan Greenspan. O problema com a fala de Greenspan é que ele não pode se declarar inocente, executou política semelhante (apesar de em grau muito menor) quando era presidente do Fed.

Vejam o texto abaixo, que é do Wall Street Journal, mas como não é disponibilizado ao público peguei parte no site Zero Hedge.

Mr. Greenspan’s comments to the Council on Foreign Relations came as Fed officials were meeting in Washington, D.C., and expected to announce within hours an end to the bond purchases.

He said the bond-buying program was ultimately a mixed bag. He said that the purchases of Treasury and mortgage-backed securities did help lift asset prices and lower borrowing costs. But it didn’t do much for the real economy.

“Effective demand is dead in the water” and the effort to boost it via bond buying “has not worked,” said Mr. Greenspan. Boosting asset prices, however, has been “a terrific success.”

...

He observed that history shows central banks can only prick bubbles at great economic cost. “It’s only by bringing the economy down can you burst the bubble,” and that was a step he wasn't willing to take while helming the Fed, he said.

...

The question of when officials should begin raising interest rates is “one of those questions I cannot answer,” Mr. Greenspan said.

He also said, “I don’t think it’s possible” for the Fed to end its easy-money policies in a trouble-free manner....

"Recent episodes in which Fed officials hinted at a shift toward higher interest rates have unleashed significant volatility in markets, so there is no reason to suspect that the actual process of boosting rates would be any different, Mr. Greenspan said.

...

“I think that real pressure is going to occur not by the initiation by the Federal Reserve, but by the markets themselves,” Mr. Greenspan he said.

Mr. Greenspan said gold is a good place to put money these days given its value as a currency outside of the policies conducted by governments.

Banqueiro Admite Bancos Centrais Elevam a Desigualdade de Renda.

Vejam o discurso abaixo de Yves Mersch, membro do Banco Central Europe, publicado no site do Banco. Em suma, dinheiro dos governos, dado por meio dos bancos centrais, está indo para quem já tem dinheiro, para banqueiros, basicamente ao se comprar os ativos dos banqueiros e punir os poupadores com juros baixos.

Para se ver o resultado disto, basta ver como está a desigualdade de renda nos Estados Unidos, depois de cinco anos de "pau na máquina", de enormes, nunca vistos estímulos financeiros. Vejam aqui que a desigualdade de renda bate recordes nos Estados Unidos.

Leiam o texto de Mersch, marquei em negrito as partes mais reveladoras da desigualdade de renda provocada pelos bancos centrais.

Vou colocar aqui parte do discurso.

Keynote speech by Yves Mersch, Member of the Executive Board of the ECB, 

Corporate Credit Conference,
Zurich, 17 October 2014

The rise of inequality

Let me begin with inequality, which has recently re-emerged as a topic of wide public debate. ^[1] From a central banker’s perspective, the most relevant aspects of recent works concern the assessment that monetary policy can have sizeable distributional effects. Indeed, inequality has been largely ignored in discussions of monetary policy. But this might be changing.

In part, this is because of the potentially negative impact of rising inequality on financial stability. For example, some – not least the current governor of the Reserve Bank of India – have argued that US policies to circumvent the consequences of inequality fuelled financial instability ahead of the crisis. ^[2] But while income inequality may have driven the credit boom that preceded the US subprime crisis, comparative and historical evidence suggests that there is little relationship between rising inequality and financial crises. ^[3]

More generally, inequality is of interest to central banking discussions because monetary policy itself has distributional consequences which in turn influence the monetary transmission mechanism. For example, the impact of changes in interest rates on the consumer spending of an individual household depend crucially on that household’s overall financial position – whether it is a net debtor or a net creditor; and whether the interest rates on its assets and liabilities are fixed or variable.

Such differences have macroeconomic implications, as the economy’s overall response to policy changes will depend on the distribution of assets, debt and income across households – especially in times of crisis, when economic shocks are large and unevenly distributed. For example, by boosting – first – aggregate demand and – second – employment, monetary easing could reduce economic disparities; at the same time, if low interest rates boost the prices of financial assets while punishing savings deposits, they could lead to widening inequality.

Insofar, central bankers have a technical, non-judgemental interest in the distribution of income and wealth in a society.

The distributional effects of monetary policy: theory and evidence

So what do we know about the impact of monetary policy on the distribution of wealth, income and consumption? A comprehensive study published recently by the National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER) outlines five potential channels by which more accommodative measures might affect inequality. ^[4]

The first is the ‘income composition channel’: while most households rely primarily on earnings from their work, others receive larger shares of their income from business and financial income. If more expansionary monetary policy raises profits more than wages, then those with claims to ownership of firms will tend to benefit disproportionately. Since the latter also tend to be wealthier, this channel should lead to higher inequality in response to more accommodative monetary policy.

The second is the ‘financial segmentation channel’: if some individuals and organisations frequently trade in financial markets and are affected by changes in the money supply before others, then an increase in the money supply will redistribute wealth towards those most connected to markets. To the extent that households that participate actively in financial transactions typically have higher income, then this channel also implies that consumption inequality should rise after expansionary monetary policy shocks.

The third is the ‘portfolio channel’: if low-income households tend to hold relatively more cash and fewer financial assets than high-income households, then potentially inflationary actions on the part of the central bank would represent a transfer from low- to high-income households. Again, this would tend to increase consumption inequality.

The NBER study outlines two further channels that tend to move inequality in the opposite direction in response to expansionary monetary policy. The first is the ‘savings redistribution channel’: lower interest rates will benefit borrowers and hurt savers. To the extent that savers are generally wealthier than borrowers, this will generate a reduction in consumption inequality.

The second is the ‘earnings heterogeneity channel’: earnings from jobs are the primary source of income for most households and earnings for high- and low-income households may respond differently to monetary policy. This could occur, for example, if unemployment falls disproportionately on low-income groups: evidence does suggest that that labour earnings at the bottom of the distribution are most affected by business cycle fluctuations. So if monetary policy reduces unemployment, it will also reduce inequality.

In addition, the income composition channel could potentially lead to reduced, rather than increased, inequality as a result of expansionary monetary policy. Because low-income households receive, on average, a larger share of their income from transfers and because transfers tend to be countercyclical, then this component of income heterogeneity could lead to reduced income inequality.

All these different channels imply that the effect of monetary policy on economic inequality is a priori ambiguous. The study therefore looks at US data from 1980 to assess whether monetary policy has contributed to changes in inequality and, if so, through which channels. The researchers find that contractionary monetary policy shocks have significant long-run effects on inequality.

In particular, they note the sensitivity of inequality measures to monetary policy actions at the zero-bound. They conclude that nominal interest rates hitting the zero-bound in times when the central bank’s systematic response to economic conditions calls for negative rates is conceptually similar to the economy being subject to a prolonged period of contractionary monetary policy.

A report last year by the McKinsey Global Institute looks specifically at the period of what it calls ultra-low interest rates. ^[5] It suggests that as a result of low rates in the US, the UK and the euro area, households have lost a combined $630 billion as lower interest earned on deposits and other fixed income investments has outweighed lower interest payments on debt. Younger households, which tend to be net borrowers, have gained while older households, which tend to be net savers, have lost at a time when many countries have introduced pension reforms affecting the benefits of pensioners

Rising asset prices prompted by monetary easing could potentially offset this effect. But while bond prices have clearly risen, the McKinsey report finds little evidence that non-standard monetary policy has boosted equity markets.

James Bullard, president of the Federal Reserve Bank of St Louis, has also examined the post-2008 experience and whether quantitative easing has exacerbated US inequality. ^[6] It has been suggested that the Fed’s policy of buying US government bonds and mortgage-backed securities has depressed real yields on relatively safe assets and thus encouraged savers to move into riskier assets, such as equities, raising their prices. Since only half of US households hold equities and they tend to be the wealthiest households, this policy could be making the wealth distribution more unequal.

The analysis suggests that quantitative easing has influenced equity prices, but he does not think that this has made the US income or wealth distribution worse. It is, he says, only as good or bad as it was before the crisis.

Bullard also examines whether current US monetary policy hurts savers. He argues that Fed policy generally and quantitative easing in particular have influenced the real yield earned by savers. The question is then whether the Fed has helped or hurt the situation by pushing real yields lower. This hinges on whether credit markets have been functioning smoothly during the period of quantitative easing.

If credit markets were working perfectly, then the Fed intervention to push real yields lower than normal was unwarranted and the low real yields were indeed punishing savers. At the same time, it is difficult to argue that credit markets have been working perfectly over the past five years. But as time passes, he concludes, it becomes increasingly difficult to argue that credit markets remain in a state of disrepair, and thereby to justify continued low real rates.

One final piece of literature on monetary policy and inequality outside the euro area lies in recent research by Ayako Saiki and Jon Frost at De Nederlandsche Bank. ^[7] They have examined the impact of unconventional monetary policy on the distribution of income in Japan, a country whose long history of non-standard measures makes it particularly relevant. Their results show that while aggressive monetary policy finally seems to be having the desired effect on the economy, this strong medicine has come with the unwanted side-effect of higher income inequality.

They suggest a straightforward mechanism via the portfolio channel: an increase in the monetary base (through purchases of both safe and risky assets) tends to increase asset prices. Higher asset prices benefit primarily those on higher incomes, who hold a larger amount and share of overall savings in equities, and thus benefit from greater capital income. Overall, the Bank of Japan’s unconventional policies have widened income inequality, especially after the collapse of Lehman Brothers in 2008, when quantitative easing became more aggressive.

The researchers conclude that their study holds lessons for other countries undertaking unconventional monetary policy. While preventing deflation and repairing the monetary transmission mechanism at the zero-bound is inherently a difficult undertaking, Japan’s experience provides a cautionary tale on the potential side-effects. It is possible that the portfolio channel will be even larger in the US, the UK and many euro area economies, where households hold a larger portion of their savings in equities and bonds.

(Agradeço o texto de Mersch ao aite Zero Hedge)

Pesquisa: Esquerdistas são mais Intolerantes e Ficam Informados no Facebook.

Pesquisa bastante reveladora da Pew Research, que mostra coisas como o que vai acima: os esquerdistas mais radicais são os mais intolerantes em se tratando de opinião contrária a sua. Bom, basta ver o que ocorre atualmente no Brasil, nesta semana de eleição.

É uma pequisa sobre o uso de redes sociais.

Inicialmente mostra a força do Facebook (e eu nem uso facebook, estou fora e vou continuar):

Os esquerdistas tendem a ficar informados pelo twitter e facebook mais do que os conservadores.

Já li que o Pew Research tem um viés esquerdista, não tenho como comprovar, mas, se for verdade, não conseguiu esconder fatos básicos do esquerdismo.

Leiam o resto da pesquisa, clicando aqui.

(Agradeço a indicação ao site Weasel Zippers)

Atenção Aécio e Dilma - Livro: "Parem de Querer Ajudar"

O roteirista (autor de vários filmes), Andrew Klabvan desafiou os esquerdistas a ler o livro acima. É de autoria do jornalista do Wall Street Journal Jason L. Riley. Riley critica os programa sociais e "ações afirmativas" que têm objetivo de "ajudar" os negros nos Estados Unidos.

Parece uma ótima leitura para todos, não apenas nos Estados Unidos. Ainda mais agora no Brasil onde os dois candidatos à presidência, Aécio Neves e Dilma Rousseff, prometem mais e mais programas sociais. 

Aliás, acho que a Dilma não sabe o que é "igualdade de oportunidades". Ela fala disso como se fosse uma coisa que o Estado provesse ao selecionar raça, grau social, etc. para ser beneficiado. Não, não é isso.  "Igualdade de oportunidades" tem foco nas oportunidades e não em diferenças de raça, credo, sexo,....Igualdade de oportunidades é uma lógica conservadora e não da esquerda. É o incentivo ao melhoramento da qualidade da escola para todos, por exemplo, pobres, ricos, brancos, negros, índios, gays, homens, mulheres e crianças. E não incentivar alguns tipos a ingressar no mercado de trabalho ou na escola. E Aécio continua falando: "eu vou ampliar e melhorar os programas sociais de hoje".

Aliás, eu acho que a Igreja Católica também deveria ler este livro, para entender o lado perverso e destruidor de programas sociais "que querem ajudar". E parar de apoiar de forma indiscriminada todo programa social.

Eu acompanho o que diz Andrew Klavan, por que ele costuma falar de política de forma cômica no site Truth Revolt. É sempre bem divertido.

Mas sobre o livro de Riley, ele não brinca, vejamos o que ele diz:

I Dare The Left To Read This Book

Jason L. Riley has written a new book entitled Please Stop Helping Us. If you are a conservative, I urge you to read it. If you are a leftist, I dare you.

I’ve shaken hands with Riley once or twice but I don’t know him. He’s on the editorial board of the Wall Street Journal. If you ever watch the excellent Journal Editorial Report on Fox News, he’s the bald black guy. He always seems smart to me but so does everyone else on the show.

His book was just one of the numerous galleys I regularly receive from publishers. I glanced at it — and next thing I knew, I had read it cover to cover. It was the inspiration for my new Revolting Truth video, “Why Democrats Call You Racist,” released here last Thursday.

The subtitle of Please Stop Helping Us is: “How Liberals Make It Harder for Blacks to Succeed.”  But if you’re expecting some sort of raging turn-the-tables tirade, it isn’t that at all. Riley’s writing is restrained, open-minded and fact-based. “My goal,” he writes modestly, “is to assess some of the social policy and thinking that arose from the ruins of Jim Crow. Good intentions aside, which efforts have facilitated black advancement, and which efforts have impeded it?”

Others have dealt with these issues. (Riley dedicates the book to Thomas Sowell and Shelby Steele.) But Riley’s condensed, statistic-backed, personal-yet-dispassionate style provides an uncommonly stark and complete 176-page examination of the results of leftist policies on black Americans.  Bottom line:  they’ve failed and they continue to make things worse.

Leftist intellectual defenses of dysfunction in black American culture have abetted and magnified the devastation caused by that dysfunction. Misguided charges of racism against police have made it easier for black criminals to prey on the vast majority of law-abiding black citizens. Minimum wage laws have increased black unemployment. The Obama administration’s war on school choice has harmed black education.  And Affirmative Action has increased African American failure. When race is removed from the college application process, black enrollment first falls off, then rebounds, and black success rates increase as people enter colleges that are in line with their capabilities.

Rather than face these facts, the left establishment continually cries “Squirrel!” either attempting to silence critics of their policies with accusations of racism or ginning up meaningless controversy over individual events and statements of little general import.

When Donald Sterling was recently caught on tape making racist remarks, Rosalyn M. Brock, the chairman of the board of the NAACP, wrote in USA Today:  “So much for the post-racial society that was supposed to have been ushered in by the election of Barack Obama in 2008. We Americans have a long way to go. Race still matters.”

This is trash and nonsense. So was the overblown press coverage of Trayvon Martin’s death, no matter what the truth of it. So were any number of other controversies sparked by individual events and statements.

Because individuals will always be racist everywhere. Such events will always happen. Such statements will always be made. Weaving them into a narrative of nationwide bigotry — demanding they all be eradicated: this is simply a strategy used by left wing political organizations like the NAACP to distract from their failure in order to keep and expand their power.

“Fifty years into the war on poverty, the picture isn’t pretty,” Riley writes.  “The black-white poverty gap has widened over the last decade and the poverty rate among blacks is no longer declining. The black-white disparity in incarceration rates today is larger than it was in 1960. And the black unemployment rate has, on average, been twice as high as the white rate for five decades...  black America has long been stuck in a severe recession. Confronted with these statistics, liberals continue to push for the same ‘solutions’ that clearly haven’t worked before.”

There are racists on the right; of course there are. But left wing policies hurt black Americans wholesale. For the good of all Americans, they need to be dismantled and the people who support them should be voted out of office.

O Feminismo tirou a Mulher de Casa. Deixou o quê lá?

O mundo "progressistas" moderno quer a "libertação das mulheres". Elas querem trabalhar e merecem o salário igual ao dos homens, Parece uma coisa simples e lógica para se defender. Quem iriai se opor a isso?

Bom, eu diria que todos os filhos pequenos se oporiam. Os meus filhos, mesmo eu sendo pai, sempre detestaram que eu fosse trabalhar. Hoje, os filhos ficam sem pai, nem mãe, assistindo televisões com babás ou em creches desde meses de vida. Quem educa hoje são televisões, babás e professoras, na maioria das vezes, completamente despreparadas e que não vão se dedicar exclusivamente aos seus filhos. 

Sem falar no rastro de milhões de abortos. Só nos Estados Unidos, conta-se 50 milhões de abortos desde 1973.

Chesterton disse que hoje as mulheres são mais torturadas do que antes quando ficavam em casa, pois elas têm de ser a "rainha do lar" e  a "grande executiva" ao mesmo tempo.

Dusty Gates escreveu um excelente texto sobre o assunto no site da Crisis Magazine. É um texto que conta a situação das mulheres e filhos hoje em dia nos Estados Unidos e como elas são recebidas e pagas no mercado de trabalho, lembrando a importância de que a definição dos salários pensem nas famílias.

Vou colocar aqui apenas parte do texto, é um texto bastante longo mais que merece ser lido na integra.

The Death of Our Family Wage Culture

DUSTY GATES

The U.S. Department of Labor reports that last year, only one-fifth of married couple homes were supported solely by the employment of the husband. The wife was the only employed member of the household in 7.8 percent of married-couple homes (with 6.2 percent supported by other employment combinations, and 18.5 percent having no employed members). The numbers get even more interesting, and troubling, when they are specified to families with children. In 2013, almost 70 percent of all mothers, married and single, with children under the age of eighteen were participants in the labor force (either as employees or as those actively looking for employment). Notice that the presence of children in the home makes it more likely, rather than less, that women will be driven to seek employment outside of the home.

This makes sense, considering the addition expenses that come with raising children. But perhaps the perceived sensibility of this trend deserves a second look, considering the additional time and effort needed, and hopefully desired, by women with children in order to adequately provide for the nurturing, care, and education of their young. While the added expense of children is significant, it seems that the demands in time, energy, and attentiveness are greater yet.

...

Gender CompetitionHistorian Allan Carlson links the erosion of the natural family unit with the loss of the “family wage culture” that had made the baby boom of the 1950s possible. Carlson suggests that the movement towards a family wage economy had been initiated in the 1840s by social reformers and Catholic theorists, whose “proudest achievement was the liberation of married women from toil in the factories, so that they might care for the home and children and so prevent the full industrialization of human life.” In order to achieve this sort of culture, Carlson notes, wage discrimination against women was required. Working women were paid an “individual wage,” with the assumption that they were not supporting dependents and were merely supplementing their husband’s wages. This family wage culture was able to thrive even after 1942 wartime regulations prohibited wage discrimination against women. According to Carlson, “equal pay for equal work was basically achieved by 1945. But for another 25 years, job segregation by gender more than compensated for this. Women workers crowded into ‘women’s jobs’ that invariably paid less than ‘men’s jobs,’ and the so-called wage gap between men and women actually grew.” This system, which had a direct effect on higher marriage and birth rates, would finally collapse in the wake of further policy changes. Carlson asserts “the addition, as an afterthought, of the word sex to Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, became by 1970 the chief tool in eliminating job segregation by gender, so ending the nation’s informal family wage system.”

ImmigrationWhile this is a multifaceted and difficult subject to approach from the perspective of morality and social justice, it has clearly observable implications in the economic sphere. Recent reports suggest that immigration rates have resulted in considerable wage reduction in the U.S., particularly in lower-skilled professions. In his article “On Immigration: It’s Time to Defend Americans,” Senator Jeff Sessions (R-AL) cites data “showing that since 2000 all of the net gain in the number of working-age (16 to 65) people holding a job has gone to immigrants,” and claims this surplus of labor is partly responsible for the reduction of the median U.S. household income by almost $6,000 from 2007 to 2012. While there were certainly other factors at work during these years, Sessions asserts that immigration played no small role.

Perhaps the modern confusion about the definition of marriage, the essence of family, the responsible role of government in the economy, and even the nature of happiness in general, have all contributed to our contemporary views on household economics. In our attempt to provide everybody with what they think they want, be it a career of a certain sort or just a convenience of a certain sort, perhaps we have deprived one another of what we truly desire. In What’s Wrong with the World, G.K. Chesterton wrote, “I do not deny that women have been wronged and even tortured; but I doubt if they were ever tortured so much as they are tortured now by the absurd modern attempt to make them domestic empresses and competitive clerks at the same time.” In the same vein, John Senior suggested in The Restoration of Christian Culture that “Woman’s place is in the home not because some chauvinist put her there, but because there is a law of gravity in human nature, as there is in physics, by which we seek our happiness at the center.”

Each married couple must discern for themselves the most prudent and proper way to provide for their families; financially, spiritually, socially, and emotionally. Many families may very well be best suited by having both parents work outside of the home. But something tells me that many more families will be even better suited by making the difficult choices and efforts required to live, and even thrive, with only one parent engaged in outside employment. The job of our policymakers and employers, then, is to encourage and provide the opportunity for a society made up of cooperative families supported by breadwinners to emerge.

Os Bancos "Too Big to Fail" Continuam Políticas para "Fail"

A Bloomberg hoje escreve sobre a contabilidade dos grandes (enormes) bancos do mundo. Eles continuam em trajetória de enormes (gigantescas) perdas, sempre confiando que são "too big to fail", que o governos estão sempre prontos para ajudar com dinheiro público. O que aconteceu na crise de 2008, não é suficiente para alterar as políticas destes bancos.

Vejam parte do texto da Bloomberg abaixo:

Too-Big-to-Fail Banks Face Up to $870 Billion Capital Gap
By John Glover and Jim Brunsden

Too big to fail is likely to prove a costly epithet for the world’s biggest banks as regulators demand they increase holdings of debt securities to cover losses should they collapse.

The shortfall facing lenders from JPMorgan Chase & Co. (JPM) to HSBC Holdings Plc could be as much as $870 billion, according to estimates from AllianceBernstein Ltd., or as little as $237 billion forecast by Barclays Plc.

The range is so wide because proposals from the Basel-based Financial Stability Board outline various possibilities for the amount lenders need to have available as a portion of risk-weighted assets. With those holdings in excess of $21 trillion at the lenders most directly affected, small changes to assumptions translate into big numbers.

“The direction is clear and it is clear that we are talking about huge amounts,” said Emil Petrov, who heads the capital solutions group at Nomura International Plc in London. “What is less clear is how we get there. Regulatory timelines will stretch far into the future but how quickly will the market demand full compliance?”

The FSB wants to limit the damage the collapse of a major bank would inflict on the world economy by forcing them to hold debt that can be written down to help recapitalize an insolvent lender. For senior bonds to suffer losses under present rules the institution has to enter bankruptcy, a move that would inflict huge damage on the financial system worldwide if it happened to a global bank.

Lehman Brothers

That’s what happened when Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. collapsed in 2008, prompting governments around the world to step in with taxpayers money to rescue lenders placed at risk in the turmoil that followed.

The FSB, which consists of regulators and central bankers from around the world, will present its draft rules to a G-20 summit in Brisbane, Australia, next month. Its proposals call for 27 of the world’s largest banks to hold loss-absorbing debt and equity equivalent to 16 percent to 20 percent of their risk-weighted assets to take losses in a failure, ensuring investors rather than taxpayers pick up the bill should a lender collapse.

Under the plans, these lenders will also have to meet buffer rules set by the Basel Committee on Banking Supervision, another group of global regulators. These can amount to a further 5 percent of risk-weighted assets, taking banks’ requirements to as much as 25 percent of holdings.

‘Significant Shortfalls’

“There’s a huge potential stream of issuance to be done,” said Steve Hussey, who heads financial institutions research at AllianceBernstein in London. The company manages the equivalent of $473 billion. “If the requirements were implemented today then there would be significant shortfalls and pressure for issuance of all kinds of eligible capital.”

Using the 16 percent figure, the shortfall globally is about $375 billion, according to Hussey. At 20 percent, the requirement would be $870 billion, which he called “extreme.” He expects European lenders to have larger needs than the U.S.

Americanos Trabalham Mais = São mais Ricos

Os americanos trabalham mais do que os trabalhadores de outros países desenvolvidos, é o que mostra pesquisa Gallup. Eles seriam "workaholics".

Bom, não é de se estranhar que eles são o país mais rico do mundo.

Quando o Brasil vai aprender que o crescimento econômico depende do trabalho e não de benesses públicas?

Os sindicatos (no Brasil e em boa parte do mundo) lutam por menos boras de trabalho, em suma lutam por um país mais pobre.

O pior é que durante o governo Obama, os Estados Unidos estão seguindo o modelo falido europeu, de prover mais benesses públicas por menos trabalho.

Vejam gráfico acima e texto da Forbes.

Americans Work Nights And Weekends More Than Anyone Else [Infographic]

When it comes to vacation days, workers in the United States get a pretty raw deal compared to everyone else. If that wasn’t bad enough, they also have to work more nights and weekends than people in other developed nations.

Working hours have gradually increased since the 1970s and today, it would be fair to call the United States a nation of workaholics. A Gallup poll recently suggested a standard 40-hour week now lasts 47 hours.

Unsurprisingly, lots of this extra working time is getting jammed into the weekend. Over a quarter of Americans work nights while nearly 30 percent work during the weekend. This is in stark contrast to somewhere like the Netherlands where just 7 percent of people work nights and 20 percent put in a shift during the weekend.

Why? Financial incentives offered by many companies for irregular working hours may be one reason. These days, many Americans have also taken on a second job and the evenings/weekends are the only times to get through that mountain of work.

Pequenas Inflações e Pobreza.

Desde 1938 a renda nos Estados Unidos aumentou 30 vezes, mas os imóveis subiram 76 vezes e a educação em Harvard aumentou em 142 vezes, destaca o site Zero Hedge

Eu diria que há muitos caminhos para o subdesenvolvimento, a pobreza e até para a destruição de um país, a inflação me parece apenas uma conseqüência e o não a causa, mas vale o texto sobre a Venezuela do Mises Economic Blog.

The Road to Poverty Is Paved with Small Inflations

By Carmen Elena Dorobăț

Thursday, October 2nd, 2014

The value of Venezuela’s currency plummeted to record lows on the black market last week, with 100 ‘strong’ bolivars exchanging for $1 (ten times lower than the official rate), and annual price inflation reaching 63%. Chavez’s successor Nicolas Maduro, continuing to denounce the “capitalist economic war” on his socialist regime, now blames airlinesfor trying to collect ticket revenues the government isn’t able to pay. Meanwhile, the Venezuelan economy is showing symptoms of a rapidly forming crack-up boom: shortage of basic amenities, power outages, depletion of dollar reserves by 30%, and looming debt default. As people scramble to exchange paper money for anything and everything that can still be found on store shelves, “over there”—say their Columbian neighbors just across the border—“there’s no food.”

The ‘final and total catastrophe of the currency system’—as Mises called the terminus point of any sustained inflation—was in fact brewing in Venezuela long before Maduro’s regime, and the country experienced even higher price inflation in late 1990s. But because people held the belief that prices might fall at some point in the future, and continued to increase or maintain their cash balances, the earlier stages of the inflationary process were drawn out over many years. However, two Caracas entrepreneurs have warned that it is now too late for the government to salvage anything: “people clearly haven’t had confidence in [the bolivar] for decades; and even less now… It doesn’t look like the market has much confidence in the government’s ability to get things under control”.

While Maduro’s regime is leading its people to poverty in a quick, conspicuous manner, other governments are more willing to wait and conceal their intentions. Moderate price inflation has been simmering for decades in Western economies, where central banks make it their official mission to keep prices increasing at an annual rate of 2%—which means doubling them over the course of 30 years. Beneath this goal of ‘price stability’, central banks’ balance sheets quadrupled by 2012 and brought about a global financial crisis. However, this produced no rampant commodity price inflation, and no flight into real goods is likely to happen in the foreseeable future.

But does that really mean that we’re a world away from Venezuelan-like problems? As Mises pointed out, not necessarily:

If you talk about a catastrophe of the money, you need not always have in mind a total breakdown of the currency system… [Price] changes are not the same, nor [do they occur] to the same degree in various countries. But one should not exaggerate the difference in the effects brought about by the greater inflations as against the smaller inflations. The effects of the “smaller inflations” are also bad. […] If the government destroys the money, it not only destroys something of extreme importance for the system, the savings people have set aside to invest and to take care of themselves in some emergency; it also destroys the very system itself. Monetary policy is the center of economic policy (Mises 2010, 31-2)

[W]hat we have to realize, what we have to know when we are dealing with money and monetary problems, is always the same… the increase in the quantity of money, the increase of those things which have the power to be used for monetary purposes, must be restricted at every point (Mises 2010, 24)

Great or small, inflation hurts the masses, leading to the destruction of savings, as well as unemployment and overall impoverishment, while concentrating wealth in the hands of elites privileged by their position in the monetary hierarchy. If inflation doesn’t stop, the breakdown of the monetary system—whether fast or slow—will also bring about the destruction of the social division of labor. From this point of view, the difference between inflation ‘over here’ and inflation ‘over there’ is only a matter of how quickly we become poor.