In other words, taxpayers are on the ropes and have no money, but they can at least look forward to being paid off by a program whose revenues are derived entirely from more burdensome taxation.

Oh wait, I'm sorry, Social Security has that huge trust fund consisting of U.S. Treasury debt, which is *money good*, as long as enough income and wealth can be confiscated from future taxpayers (whether through higher tax rates or the Keynesian preferred, backdoor method of inflation).

Sheesh … this kind of economic reasoning does Rube Goldberg proud.

Sticking to plain ol' economics will always seem boring and incredibly obvious (if not a bit helpful in finding a hands-on solution) or overly technical and indigestible (if not bit unhelpful in finding a clear-cut and certain) solution.

“a mix of the completely sensible (propping up bad banks is a recipe for further looting by insiders and more stupid risk-taking) and a totally crazy conviction that modern states are economically magical institutions.”

The social democrat pulsating below Galbraith's economist veneer cannot add much of anything new to the crisis discussion without gluing economics together with his assumptions. He may or may not even know he's doing it.

I think it's difficult for any economist to leave certain ideological assumptions and priors aside when making economic commentary.

I never got that the first time through his article and, you know, second time through it still doesn't seem that way.

What type of eyeglasses do you wear anyway?

Deutschlands Banken krise

Wie «Spiegel»-Online schreibt, hätten die Banken der deutschen Finanzdienstleistungsaufsicht BaFin gemeldet, dass sie über ihre Schweizer Töchter «Konten von mehreren hundert liechtensteinischen Stiftungen führen». «Spiegel»-Online beruft sich bei den Informationen auf einen «Insider».

Berlin habe bereits Konsequenzen gezogen. Die Vorschriften zur Umsetzung der Sorgfaltspflicht seien massiv verschärft worden, so in dem Bericht weiter. Ab April müssten die Banken ihre Tochtergesellschaften anweisen, intransparente Geschäftsbeziehungen zu kündigen, zitiert «Spiegel»-Online das deutsche Bundesministerium für Finanzen.

Wie es in dem Bericht weiter heisst, wollte die Deutsche Bank dazu keine Stellung nehmen. Auch die Commerzbank und ihre Tochter Dresdner Bank schweigten.

And I also think he's saying that one of the original reasons SS was set up, because Americans did such a poor job planning for retirement, is as true today as it was 60 years ago.

A negative savings rate followed by a 50% drop in value for most families' primary investment is a recipe for reliance on government retirement programs.