I feel for immigrant kids, who came to the US as children, have grown up here, attended school, maybe college as well. As a kid, when your folks decide to move to the US without paperwork, what can you do? If mom and dad go north, you go with them. At age six, or twelve, or even eighteen you go with mom and dad. Speaking for myself, I'm in favor of giving a big break to any kids who were brought here at a tender age.
But, as a matter of process, should not this policy be set by act of Congress, rather than just a president's say so? Is Congress so dysfunctional that it could not pass a bill giving people brought in the country as children a break? If for no other reason, we ought to bring a DACA bill to a vote just to see who is for it and who is agin it.
For that matter, how about a bill giving full US citizenship to anyone who completes a hitch in the armed forces and wins an honorable discharge? It worked for the Romans, they would enlist anyone, and they gained Roman citizenship after twenty years service in the legions.
Friday, September 1, 2017
Thursday, August 31, 2017
Wall St "repos". Legitimate financing or just plain gambling?
It's a very short term lending scheme. The borrower sells some financial paper (often US T-bills) to raise money, but promises the buyer that they will buy the paper back shortly, at a small profit. The deal is actually a short term loan, but on paper it looks like a sale.
Question: what useful purpose is served by short term loans? Legitimate reasons for borrowing are to build or buy plant and equipment, buy inventory for later sale, finance real estate (buying, building, whatever) finance research and development, in short to finance useful economic activity. All of this stuff takes time, years sometimes, to pay off. Short term loans, over night loans in some cases, don't cut it. All I can see a short term loan doing is making your books look better (more cash on hand) for a financial report, or to finance stock trading. I think short term loans are gambling pure and simple and ought to be taxed out of existence.
Used to be, J.P. Morgan handled a lot of these deals. For undisclosed reasons J.P Morgan decided to get out of the business last year. Perhaps they see it as dangerous and high risk. At this point 85% of the deals go thru Bank of New York. Wall St players are worrying that if anything goes wrong (power failure, fire, flood, hacker attack, whatever) at Bank of New York, the whole repo market is toast. A good reason not to get into repos in my book.
Repos are widely seen as one of the triggers for Great Depression 2.0. Fear of repos caused everyone to stop lending to Bear Stearns and Lehman Brothers, which crashed both firms in the fall of 2007. The Federal Reserve has wanted to overhaul the repos business for nearly a decade (with little luck). The Treasury's Office of Financial Research estimates the repo market at $3.5 trillion, which is a lot of money. Enough to touch off another great depression if things should go wrong.
Sounds like a land mine waiting for someone to step on it.
Question: what useful purpose is served by short term loans? Legitimate reasons for borrowing are to build or buy plant and equipment, buy inventory for later sale, finance real estate (buying, building, whatever) finance research and development, in short to finance useful economic activity. All of this stuff takes time, years sometimes, to pay off. Short term loans, over night loans in some cases, don't cut it. All I can see a short term loan doing is making your books look better (more cash on hand) for a financial report, or to finance stock trading. I think short term loans are gambling pure and simple and ought to be taxed out of existence.
Used to be, J.P. Morgan handled a lot of these deals. For undisclosed reasons J.P Morgan decided to get out of the business last year. Perhaps they see it as dangerous and high risk. At this point 85% of the deals go thru Bank of New York. Wall St players are worrying that if anything goes wrong (power failure, fire, flood, hacker attack, whatever) at Bank of New York, the whole repo market is toast. A good reason not to get into repos in my book.
Repos are widely seen as one of the triggers for Great Depression 2.0. Fear of repos caused everyone to stop lending to Bear Stearns and Lehman Brothers, which crashed both firms in the fall of 2007. The Federal Reserve has wanted to overhaul the repos business for nearly a decade (with little luck). The Treasury's Office of Financial Research estimates the repo market at $3.5 trillion, which is a lot of money. Enough to touch off another great depression if things should go wrong.
Sounds like a land mine waiting for someone to step on it.
FDA approves Novartis $475,000 cancer treatment
It's for aggressive leukemia in children and young adults. It's a fancy procedure actually, the patient's blood is drawn, its T-cells separated and then genetically modified, and then injected back into the patient. Sounds pretty costly. And it is. I don't want to answer the question "Is a human life worth $475,000?" Nor do I want to have to pay $475,000 to stay alive. Nor do I want to die, at least not just yet. Clearly I have some unresolved philosophical issues here. Norvartis calls this product/procedure "Kymriah".
Wednesday, August 30, 2017
Reverse Mortgages
They advertise them on TV all the time. The ads make it sound like free money. Today's Wall St Journal has a piece that fills in some of the gaps. According to the Journal, the bank gets your house when you die. So much for leaving it to your children. And us taxpayers anti up for program losses, which ran $12 billion since 2009. That's $1.5 billion a year. Ouch.
On the other hand, it's cheaper than nursing homes.
On the other hand, it's cheaper than nursing homes.
Tuesday, August 29, 2017
Words of the Weasel Part 50
"Epic" in referring to Harvey. The correct word for a flood is "biblical". Noah himself would be appalled by what is falling on Texas this weekend.
And, rainfall is measured in inches, not gallons. I have seen what 10 inches of rain will do. I can imagine what 50 inches will do. A few trillion gallons of rain means nothing to me. I have no idea what say 6 trillion gallons means. The TV is going over to reporting rainfall in Texas by the trillion gallons, rather than by the inch. Another example of newsies doing the talk but not informing anyone of anything important.
And, rainfall is measured in inches, not gallons. I have seen what 10 inches of rain will do. I can imagine what 50 inches will do. A few trillion gallons of rain means nothing to me. I have no idea what say 6 trillion gallons means. The TV is going over to reporting rainfall in Texas by the trillion gallons, rather than by the inch. Another example of newsies doing the talk but not informing anyone of anything important.
Fantastic Beasts and where to find them
Disappointing. Strange. First movie I ever watched that had a narrator. Since the soundmen cannot make the dialog understandable, this movie comes with a voice over commentary explaining what's going on to the audience. It is supposed to be a Harry Potter prequel, set in 1920's New York. No characters from the previous Harry Potter movies or the books appear in it. I never did figure out the plot. Whenever the protagonist got in the tight spot, he apparated out of it with a flash and a bang. The 1920's costumes and sets were nicely done. But I fell asleep before it was over.
The Wall St Journal had a piece the other day about how poorly movie tickets are selling this summer. This movie is one reason for that.
The Wall St Journal had a piece the other day about how poorly movie tickets are selling this summer. This movie is one reason for that.
Monday, August 28, 2017
Harvey
The damage in Texas is horrendous. Fortunately there are few deaths, so far. The TV news has been saying nice things about the number of civilian volunteers pitching in and helping out, especially with boats. That is a good thing. Too bad we have to suffer so much to bring out the good and heroism in our citizens.
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