The all-telling eye

I found this interesting because it tells of a completely new way of doing things - through the technology-human interface. And it could be an entirely new emerging industry in the field of technology. There is a lot of information encoded in facial expression; failure to detect it is the basis of autism dysfunction.

There is WHAT we say, but also HOW we say it that provides subtle secondary pregnant meaning like sarcasm, regret, or sadness.

We assume technology should be strictly robotic and unemotionally. But humans are emotional. And mastering the Technology-Human Interface was the key to Steve Job's success. Yes I smiled when I read some of the details of this fascinating essay. And who does not smile at a well written joke, pun or a word like 'spork'.

There is a 'ton' of meaning that is lost in empty words unattached to facial expressions and gestures. That is why we still have face-to-face meetings in the 21st Century

Europe’s Woes Pose New Peril to Recovery in the U.S.

This article discusses some of the very negative impacts that the European financial crisis will have on the US economy. It is a good article for helping us to remember how globalized our economic systems are, and a crisis in an economic system as big as the European Union will have detrimental effects abroad. One point that the author makes is that the dollar will appreciate relative to the Euro, making our exports more expensive and decreasing net exports over time. This can clearly be seen and understood in the open economy models that we created in class, so I though that it was interesting to see a real life example of the model. This will not be the only effect of the crisis on the US. The depreciation of the Euro will also effect financial institutions, US investment abroad, and more. It is sometimes easy to forget how much other country's financial situations will affect us, and this article is a good reminder of how important Europe's health is to our survival. We are interconnected, and their failure is not a benefit to us.

Government Pays For Restoration Procts

This article talks about the Administration Neighborhood Stabilization Program, which provides federal money to state and local governments to buy, renovate and resell vacant and foreclosed houses. The program has a $7 billion budget, $26 million of which is going to Baltimore alone. The program is relatively young, only 11,545 houses have been sold using the program, however the ANSP seems like a waste of federal money. In Baltimore, a group of non profit organizations called Healthy Neighborhoods, has been doing the same exact thing and has been reselling houses at a loss. I can't imagine that state and local governments are fairing any better than Healthy Neighborhoods, which means that federal dollars are being wasted on the effort. The money might be better served for another purpose.

Can the Fed Stimulate Growth or Only Inflation?

This article discusses what the results of current monetary policy will be. It begins by saying that the Fed would like the government to continue to use expansionary fiscal policy, as opposed to the contractionary fiscal policy it seems to be switching to. The article then discusses all the predictions of Republicans that the Fed's actions over the last few years would lead to stagflation, but in fact, we have seen minimal inflation, and deflation is currently a greater fear.

However, it seems that some economists are still taking the position that the Fed should do nothing, such as Amity Shales who believes that it is okay for prices to stay where they are or even fall, the Fed should not try to make them rise. The article concludes by saying that this position is incorrect because we are at an incredibly low risk of inflation and the conservatives who are stopping fiscal and to some extent monetary policy are only preventing us from getting back on our feet sooner.

Attention College Grads: Protesting Won't Get You a Job Read more: http://www.foxbusiness.com/personal-finance/2011/11/10/attention-college-grads-pro

This article has an interesting take on the "Occupy Wallstreet" protests. The author suggests that frustrated college grads expected their diplomas would produce the job of their dreams. Though I know the protests are ideologically deeper than that, I still think the job search advice the author gives is a good suggestion of what mindset you should have when talking with a potential employer and the search in general.

Bill Clinton's plan to save the economy.

This is a GREAT video about Bill Clinton's plan to save the American economy.
In the video, he lays out a pretty simple, but sensible plan to save the economy.
One of the things he stresses is lowering the corporate tax, something you rarely hear from a Democrat.
Just recently, Dr. Tecklenberg spoke about creating jobs in America for the mock convention and suggested the same exact thing.
Clinton believes that jobs will come when American corporations can be competitive and can bring back high-end manufacturing jobs.
He admits that although he did raise corporate taxes when he was president, that was only because the U.S. rates were still in the middle somewhere.
Now that the rates are much higher than other countries, the U.S. should lower corporate taxes and bring back jobs AND raise tax revenue, not by raising tax rates, but giving growth to the economy.

Is an Ivy League Diploma Worth It?

With many news about student loans and student debts many qualified recent high school graduates decide to enroll in public universities rather than private prestige universities. A young high school recent graduate chose to go to City University of New York's Macaulay Honors College for free rather than going to Cornell because he doesn't want to be in debt even though he's from a middle class family. Many high school student chose that path since the unemployment rate is very high. They thinks that they can go as far as other students who goes to an elite school. But you need to sacrifice since its harder to get into the classes you need in order to graduate in time at a public school because there are more students there. When the young high school graduate finally enrolled at the City University he wasn't happy there but what can he do. He already made his decision and sacrifice.

More students are choosing more affordable universities and choose to commute instead. Community college is very common lately. How far would the sacrifice go?

High Bank Fees Give Wal-Mart A Money Aisle

After reading many articles saying that most big banks such as Bank of America are increasing service fees to customers thats why many people are seeking alternatives to do their errand such as at Wal-Mart.

Wal-Mart is providing different a la carte services for people such as cashing their checks, wire money, pay bills or even loading money to debit cards for lower fee than Banks at a flat rate of $3. A lot of people tends to close their bank accounts since they are charged with hidden fees and higher service fees. Wal-Mart are not banks but they provide basic service like most bank do.

This is very interesting to me how people learn to adapt and keep finding alternatives to be able to survive with a tight budget. Im looking forward to see how Wal-Mart money center evolved in the future.

Europe's Rescue Plan

This article helps in summarizing some of the international problems that were discussed in the Economic Outlook Conference and what is going on in Europe. The summit that just happened has come up with a plan to help eliminate some of the problems going on. Some feel that this deal at best fails to solve the euro crisis; at worst it may even make it worse. As the shortcomings of each component become clear, investors’ fears will surely return, bond yields will rise and banks’ funding problems will worsen.

Brazil compared with Norway and Venezuela on the vices of oil dependence

A great article on what we just did in class and also what Andres Duartes told us about.
It relates to the pros of Norway, the cons of Venezuela and how Brazil could learn from both of these countries regarding dependence on oil.

Land of the wasted talent

This is a great article from the Economist and talks about the shrinking size of the labor force in Japan and the increasing proportion of female workers. 

Japans population of 127m is predicted to fall to 90m by 2050 and the ratio of working age Japanese to children and elderly to 1-1 from 7-1. In an economy where women constitute 50% of the population and are severely underemployed "outside the kitchen" either because they don't want to work themselves or they are not given much opportunity poses a big threat to an already troubled economy. Although Japan labor market is now less sexist, however representation of female workers is still very low because traditional employers still do not value them as they "see their role as prettifying the office and forming a pool of potential marriage partners for male employees". 

The question companies are now asking is how and where will they be able to find workers who are efficient energetic and talented? 

Will Japan be the next heaven for talented workers from the US and rest of the world?  

An Analyst's Tale

This article tells the story of a longtime financial analyst who has gotten in trouble for suggesting that there are times when bank stocks should be sold. In the article, the man, Mike Mayo, talks about his experiences trying to tell people to sell bank stocks just before crisis hits, and the incredible amount of pushback that he has received for doing that. He also talks about how few analysts in the field routinely suggest selling any stock. They say that you should either buy, or hold. However, as Mr. Mayo points out, these two options do not work in all situations, and there is definitely a time to sell. This point underlies a major issue in the financial sector. This lack of honesty about the state of the market has and will only lead to trouble. As Mr. Mayo suggests near the end of the article, more transparency is needed in the financial sector to discourage this kind of behavior.

TCS - India in the US

The article talks about TATA Consultancy services, an Indian consulting firm that has recently set up an office in Cincinnati. Even though, it is an Indian giant, it is still small compared to global giants such as HP. It is interesting in that the article talks about factors that contributed to TCS's decision of setting up an office in Cincinnati. The low cost of setting up an office, the proximity of a good market and the availability of low-cost quality labor from nearby universities (where the taskforce is cheaper than that of Ivy league schools) are all important factors. Also, the article says that they have employed a large number of American students and are looking to employ more. If you are graduating soon, this might be a good place to look!

October jobs report hints at improvement

Last month, 80,000 new jobs were created by employers in the United States. Unemployment had been at 9.1% for the previous 4 months but is now down to 9% after the October numbers. Diane Swonk, chief economist at Mesirow Financial, believes that this could be a sign of improvement for the near future in the United Sates. Although it currently remains slow, the unemployment appears to be falling slowly and indicating that our economy is heading back into the direction it needs to go. Unemployment remains the backbone of the economy and as long as we can see an increase in unemployment, there is hope that our economy can get heading back to where it needs to be.

It is good to see that unemployment numbers are decreasing and more jobs are opening in our economy. This is great news for all of us seniors and gives us a glipse of hope that we can obtain a job shortly after graduation.

Obstacles that Hinder Growth of Economy

Recently, the job market has begun to show signs of improvement. Economists forecast this growth to continue, if the economy can overcome some of the obstacles that stand in its way. Some good news has come in the form of a decrease in the unemployment rate, dropping from 9.1% to 9.0%, due to a job increase of over 1 million jobs in the job market. The average number of hours worked was 34.3% and average earnings per hour rose by .2%. Gains in temporary employment means that companies are seeing increased demand which will cause companies to increase the amount of permanent workers. Sectors such as manufacturing, health care, retail services and business services have all had job increases. However, the overall report is still too weak to make a significant dent in the amount of jobless Americans still sidelined by the recession and weak economy. The current trend of job growth is still not enough to bring down the overall unemployment rate in the immediate future. Certain "statistical quirks" undermine the trends in job growth. The overall labor force expands and contracts as new job seekers enter the market and drop out, often because of discouragement. The economy would need to produce 200,000 jobs per month more to cause a meaningful drop in the unemployment rate. The trend of employers increasing hiring rates can be attributed to the cost of taking on new workers dropping. Unit labor costs have fallen by 2.4% in the third quarter. With so much economic uncertainty in our economy, companies have been keeping inventories lean to avoid possession of unsold goods if the economy stumbles again. Another important event that will effect unemployment for the next three years is the federal budget debate, which has a deadline of November 23rd to decide all tax and government spending habits. Two other controversial issues that have significant outcomes are the issues of extended unemployment benefits and payroll tax cuts. The biggest unknown factor economists are concerned with is the financial crisis currently going on in Europe. As Europe slowly slips into a recession, the US economy runs the risk of being pulled down with it.

Euro Crisis Blamed for Canada's Hefty Job Losses

This is an interesting article that gives a good example of how the Euro Zone debt crisis is affecting countries all over the world. The article mainly focuses on unemployment in Canada which grew from 7.1% to 7.3% last month. The unstable economies in Europe and the United states are reasons for a dip in business confidence and the lack of hiring by Canadian businesses. The article gives a number of interesting statistics of different economic indicators, like value of building permits.

The Problem With Flat-Tax Fever

This article discusses the problems with a the flat tax proposals that Republican presidential candidates, such as Herman Cain and Rick Perry, are making. One of the main points it makes is that implementing a flat tax will further increase the income inequality that is present in our country. Studies show that countries with greater income inequality score lower on indices of health, well-being and quality of life.

The other point this article makes is that contrary to popular belief, a flat tax will not make it easier to file or collect taxes. What really makes filing and collecting taxes difficult are all the exemptions and such things that people have to look through to file taxes. These problems will not be eliminated with a flat tax.

Military Spending Cuts

Military spending cuts are, at least to me, something of a conundrum. While military spending is generally a waste of money in our present economic and political state any decrease in government spending may make the situation worse. There is little argument that our defense budget, at roughly $700 billion its over 6 times larger than the next highest spending country; China. We've already committed to $450 Billion in cuts however many argue it should be much more.

It does beg the interesting question of how to put a price on marginal increases in security. Is the reduction in spending cuts justified?

College Students Debt in Rough Times

This article is great. I agree that there should be help for college students and the debts they acquire while in school. It gives students who can't find jobs less pressure to find one. With the given economy there is not much you can do to help create jobs because if there was people would have figured it out by now. But if you decrease the interest rates or make it so students don't have to pay debt back until they reach a certain income then that will encourage people to go to college. This would greatly help our economy. I understand it would increase the labor force but it would help the America by making the average worker worth more. It would also encourage companies to hire Americans with degrees rather than foreigners. Companies higher foreigners because they typically are more qualified than Americans. If you make college more obtainable people would go to higher education degrees such as a masters or a doctorate. People would be pushed farther because there are more people in the labor force. People would become more educated and it would help our nation.