By Monty Pelerin, on March 11th, 2010 In a further sign of the deterioration of society, the wealthy (or formerly wealthy) believe they are entitled to be bailed out for their losses. The victims of the Madoff and Stanford scams are appealing to Congress for a bailout. Bloomberg reports:
Together, the groups hope to persuade Congress to add a requirement to the regulatory overhaul bill, now under Senate consideration, that brokerage firms pay about $4 billion in additional fees to the Securities Investor Protection Corp. fund. SIPC protects U.S. investors’ accounts against fraud or bankruptcy. The victims also want Congress to require the fund to compensate them up to $500,000 each in losses.
We all should have sympathy for the victims of these two Ponzi schemes. After all, their lives have been adversely affected, in some instances irreparably. However, to believe that the rest of the country has an obligation to make them whole is a bit outrageous.
The lobbying initiative “gives new meaning to the word chutzpah,” said James Cox, a professor at Duke University School of Law. “This is just a tax increase. It’s levied on banks but customers end up paying.”
Their effort is natural. After all, in a society that bails out banks that created the economic crisis, why would others not believe they are entitled to the same treatment? When “victimology” becomes the code, all deserve to be recompensed for anything that is bad, or even unsatisfactory. No one should lose money, even when
Continue reading The Wealthy Beg
By Monty Pelerin, on March 11th, 2010
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Washington is cleaning up the airline industry with more regulation. NOT!
This latest example of Washington intervention is more patently absurd than others. All are absurd; this example is just so simple that it is understandable without a complex chain of reasoning.
It is classic top-down management in a world that is run from the bottom up. It illustrates perfectly why reality cannot be legislated out of existence. Trying to do so always produces unintended consequences. In this, as in most examples to help consumers, your life has been made worse.
From the American Thinker:
Unintended Consequences of Regulatory Overreach: Airline Delays
Clarice Feldman
Hoping no doubt to curry favor with passengers beset by lengthy delays Administration bureaucrats set unconscionably high fines for delays. As a result airlines will simply cancel delayed flights rather than bear these punishing consequences for often unavoidable delay:
Under new federal guidelines that take effect next month, airlines can be fined up to $27,500 per passenger if a plane is stuck on the tarmac for longer than three hours.
“How can they say there is nothing wrong with having someone sit on a seat and run out of water and everything and sit on there for three, four, five hours? That’s ridiculous,” Kelly said.
With the new fines, a delayed MD-80 could cost American Airlines close to $4 million, and a fine for a full 757 could cost more than $5 million.
“It’s unavoidable that more flights will be canceled to avoid fines,” said American
Continue reading Another Blow to Air Passengers
By Monty Pelerin, on March 10th, 2010
I don’t have the data, but perhaps some readers might. I have often speculated that the cost of a state-university degree is higher than a private university. In my state, NC, it would be interesting to compare the cost per graduate of UNC-Chapel Hill to the cost per graduate of Duke University. I am speaking of cost, not tuition. Obviously, tuition at state universities is lower because it is subsidized by taxpayers. If anyone has a source of data, for either NC or any other state, I would be pleased to receive it and analyze it to test the hypothesis.
Not related to this cost comparison is a post today by Karl Denninger. Denninger takes no prisoners on his website. Here is a post dealing with the “privileged class,” the University of Illinois. I suspect most states are similar. We know from many sources that government employees are better compensated than their counterparts in the private sector.
Tuesday, March 9. 2010
Posted by Karl Denninger in Education at 19:56
IF You Are Going To “Demonstrate”….
Then aim your “demonstrating” at the people who are bankrupting your state – and you personally.
I speak specifically of people such as those that The Daily Illini pointed out – all employees for the University of Illinois.
Let’s see what we have here….
The head of the football team – the coach – makes $1 million. For coaching a college football team.
The “intercollegiate
Continue reading State University vs. Private University
By Monty Pelerin, on March 8th, 2010 A lengthy article focuses on the problems ahead. It appeared in the February American Spectator.
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By Monty Pelerin, on March 8th, 2010 Liberty as an Ephemeral Event
“If men are good, you don’t need government; if men are evil or ambivalent, you don’t dare have one.” Robert LeFevre
Introduction
It is natural for oppressed men to yearn for liberty. Once attained, it is taken for granted and assumed to continue forever. History, however, shows that liberty is both rare and ephemeral. Liberty is not the norm; it is the exception. The world is generally replete with oppression.
Our Founders understood the nature and benefits of liberty and set out to create a nation that could preserve freedom. The Jefferson and Franklin quotes below reflected their doubts regarding permanency:
“Our country is now taking so steady a course as to show by what road it will pass to destruction, to wit: by consolidation of power first, and then corruption, its necessary consequence.” Thomas Jefferson
“… I think a general Government necessary for us, and there is no form of Government but what may be a blessing to the people if well administered, and believe farther that this is likely to be well administered for a course of years, and can only end in Despotism, as other forms have done before it …” Benjamin Franklin
These giants of history were prescient and knew the dangers. Their fears are now being realized by the people of our country. Are our current problems merely a part of the (inevitable?) process foreseen by these Founders? Franklin declared that we “can only end in Despotism.”
Continue reading Why Liberty Fails
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Friedrich von Hayek
Friedrich von Hayek founded the Mont Pelerin Society.
“Monty Pelerin” is a pseudonym chosen by this blogger to convey general agreement with the philosophy, goals and spirit of the Mont Pelerin Society. No other connection exists between the blogger and the Society.
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