Shrink the State. End the Fed. Balance the budget. Make a profit. Leave an inheritance.
Gary North
Gary North’s Reality Check (Oct. 26, 2012) I want to talk about the inevitable bankruptcy of the Social Security system. I have made this case publicly for 35 years. The beginning of the bankruptcy began in fiscal year 2010. Early in that year, I produced a 90-minute video predicting that this would happen before [...]
Continue reading →This video interview posted by the Wall Street Journal talks about parents’ debt. We know about what students are personally taking on. The average debt is $40,000 at age 23, with no bankruptcy protection. But their parents are matching them. None of this is necessary. College need not cost over $15,000, total. But parents are [...]
Continue reading →Gary North’s Reality Check (Oct. 9, 2012) Most of the academic economists I know were able to retire rich. I define “rich” in a special way: the ability to quit your day job, retire permanently, and not suffer a reduction in your lifestyle. There are a lot of people who think the government has promised [...]
Continue reading →There has never been an Austrian School economist on the faculty of an Ivy League university. There have been two ex-Austrians. Three decades ago, Fritz Machlup taught at Princeton, but he had long since abandoned his Austrian views. He had been a follower of Mises until the 1940s. Mises saved his life by persuading him [...]
Continue reading →The U.S. Postal Service owes $5.6 billion to pay into its unionized workers’ health fund. It does not have the money. Let’s call this delay what is really is: a default. It is a prelude of things to come to the entire U.S. government budget. This is the second time in two months that the [...]
Continue reading →When a national government runs up huge bills by selling bonds, it cannot pay. So, it stalls. It says it will pay. It refuses to pay. The people who trusted the government and bought its bonds are ruined. The people who knew it was all a con job remain unharmed. We are seeing this play [...]
Continue reading →The unfunded liabilities of the U.S. government grew in one year by $11 trillion. So says Prof. Lawrence Kotlikoff of Boston University. He is using figures provided by the Congressional Budget Office. He makes a good point. Republicans and Democrats in Congress a year ago could not figure ways to cut $210 billion a year [...]
Continue reading →The Cato Institute has released a report on the extent of corporate welfare payments by the U.S. government in fiscal 2012. It estimates that the total package is $100 billion. Of course, this was more than offset by the costs of federal regulation. As to which companies won, net, has not been traced, nor is [...]
Continue reading →Grandparents are in the hole for $36 billion for student loans. Some of these debts are because of their grandchildren. They co-signed the loans. Then the grandkids defaulted. The grandchildren could have gotten their B.A. degrees for under $15,000 by avoiding the standard approaches to college. They could have funded all of it themselves by [...]
Continue reading →The U.S. Postal Service owes a staggering $5.5 billion to the U.S. Treasury to cover retirement health care benefits for its employees when they retire. Not that it matters. The Treasury is running a Ponzi scheme. It was not going to invest the money. It was going to cover existing obligations. The Postal Service says [...]
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