Good morning
The headlines:
- General Electric is refinancing.
Link: why companies borrow.
Wrote about it here.
- Shock. Horror. 2,400 millionaires claimed unemployment benefits.
Link: people are horrified.
This is so ridiculous.
I mean honestly.
Not that 2,400 millionaires claimed unemployment benefits – but that the Congressional Committee of whatever is even INVESTIGATING it.
So what they’re saying is, if you’re rich, but you’re temporarily in between positions, you shouldn’t get to claim unemployment benefits? Bollocks. If you pay for unemployment insurance while you’re employed, then you should get to claim it when you’re not.
That said – kudos to these people for even claiming it. If I were rich, I’d probably forget that there’re unemployment benefits to be claimed and/or I wouldn’t be hacked to go out and collect change. It’s probably why I’m not rich. Watching the pennies, etc.
But to return to the utter ridiculousness of it all – the Congressional Whatever reckons it can save $20 million over the next DECADE if it takes away these benefits from the millionaires. That’s 2 MILLION DOLLARS PER YEAR. ON AN ANNUAL DEFICIT OF OVER 1 TRILLION DOLLARS.
That’s 0.000002% of the problem.
These guys are jokers.
It would probably cost them more to police it. And it almost definitely cost them more to arrive at that conclusion.
FFS. Pay attention to an amount that matters. Like Medicare. Which will bankrupt y’all.
- Budgetary crystal meth.
Link: Mr Gross uses a metaphor.
On the topic of debt (please see today’s other post), Pacific Investment Management Co’s Bill Gross waxed super-metaphorical about America’s Debt.
Here’s Mr Gross:
Here’s what he said:
“When it comes to debt and the prospects for future debt, the US is no ‘clean dirty shirt*’. The US is, in fact, a serial offender, an addict whose habit extends beyond weed or cocaine and who frequently pleasures itself with budgetary crystal meth.”
And:
Unless the US begins to close its fiscal gap, “then the inevitable result will be that our debt/gross domestic product ratio will continue to rise, the Fed would print money to pay for the deficiency, inflation would follow and the dollar would inevitably decline. Bonds would be burned to a crisp and stocks would certainly be singed; only gold and real assets would thrive within the ‘Ring of Fire'”.
It’s like economic poetry about the end of the world.
Yes. What he said.
*?
- Spanish bailout.
Link: not soon.
Journalist: “Mr Rajoy, do you have any plans to request a bailout in the near future?”
Mr Rajoy: “No.”
"Yes I said No" It must be true.
That’s all for now.
Have a good day.
