Free Republic

Ready for a good laugh, and proof of the revisionist history that panders to baby black Jesus, aka Barack Obama? Obama has surpassed Reagan in jobs creation! That’s right, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, Obama has matched Ronald Reagan in jobs creation.According to Newsmax, a Leftist rag posing as Conservative media: Friday’s positive and hugely surprising jobs numbers not only put the U.S. economy that much closer to full employment, it also set a record that President Barack Obama now shares with former President Ronald Reagan. On Friday, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported that the national...

The grinding aftermath of an historically rare balance-sheet recession. Average monthly job growth trending lower this year than in 2014. Wage growth and homeownership rates back to levels seen in the mid-‘90s. An escalating federal deficit, now at $19 trillion, with even bigger unfunded liabilities for Social Security and Medicare bearing down. Increasing numbers of baby boomers retiring, retirees who historically spend less in their golden years, adding to deflation. The moral astigmatism of porous borders, financial bubbles, D.C. policies inimical to growth, and persistent threats of a default by the U.S. government. All big challenges... ***** While most of...

...look at the consequences of the war on drugs and the war on money laundering and tax evasion. The global war on money laundering and tax evasion has failed in the three decades since it began in earnest, and it is now on its way to undermining the rule of law around the world, the legitimate role of financial institutions, and the right of sovereign governments to determine their own tax policies. The new anti-money-laundering laws and regulations have resulted in millions of Americans who live abroad and others living outside their home countries being unable to get bank accounts...

BEGIN TRANSCRIPT RUSH: Right here in the New York Times, even today. Paul Krugman -- who hates everything conservative, hates everything Republican, and despises personally Ronald Reagan -- has a piece called, "Despair, American Style." "A couple of weeks ago President Obama mocked Republicans who are 'down on America,' and reinforced his message by doing a pretty good Grumpy Cat impression. He had a point: With job growth at rates not seen since the 1990s, with the percentage of Americans covered by health insurance hitting record highs, the doom-and-gloom predictions of his political enemies look ever more at odds with...

The American economy added 271,000 jobs in October, a very strong showing that makes an interest-rate increase by the Federal Reserve much more likely when policy makers meet next month. The report on hiring and unemployment, released Friday by the Labor Department, was eagerly anticipated on Wall Street, where traders and economists have been sifting each new bit of economic data for any augury of the central bank’s course. The unemployment rate dipped to 5.0 percent, from 5.1 in September. At this level, the unemployment rate is close to what would normally be considered the threshold for full employment by...

A low of 3.8% could be reached on the jobless rate, one strategist says The current economic recovery has, by most measures, been slower and steadier than almost any that have come before. On the one hand, the expansion has lasted 77 months - the fifth-longest since 1900. On the other, it's taken longer than any recovery since World War II to reach the same growth in output, according to Minneapolis Fed data. But David Kelly, chief global strategist at J.P. Morgan Funds, says the current recovery actually does resemble the others in one respect - the speed at which...

Tuesday’s Republican debate will be focusing on economic issues, including how to restore prosperity to this country for all Americans, how to strengthen our middle class and create more good-paying jobs. On Friday, we found out that the economy added 271,000 jobs in October with the unemployment rate falling to 5%. But those numbers don't reflect reality for millions of Americans still struggling to find a job. The number of Americans who are currently working or actively looking for work is at 62.4%, the lowest level since 1977. Median household income has actually fallen since President Obama took office in...

I am trying to find an episode of the Three Stooges wherein one of them (Curly I think) finds money on the floor (a $20 I think). "Oooo, a $20" he says. To which Moe says, "Is that the $20 you owe me?" And Larry says to Moe, "Is that the $20 you owe me?" To whom Curly says, "Is that the $20 you owe me?" To whom Moe says, "Is that the $20 you owe me?" and on and on. I thought this a perfect example of how many think an economy works (Particularly Krugman); money just circulating. I...

If you want to find people who still believe in “the American dream”—the magnetic idea that anyone can build a better life for themselves and their families, regardless of circumstance—you might be best advised to travel to Mumbai. Half of the Indians in a recent poll agreed that “the next generation will probably be richer, safer and healthier than the last.”The Indians are the most sanguine of the more than 1,000 adults in each of seven nations surveyed in early September by the market-research firm YouGov for the London-based Legatum Institute (with which I am affiliated). The percentage of...

Our riches did not come from piling brick on brick, or bachelor's degree on bachelor's degree, or bank balance on bank balance, but from piling idea on idea. **** In other words, what mattered were two levels of ideas: the ideas for the betterments themselves (the electric motor, the airplane, the stock market), dreamed up in the heads of the new entrepreneurs drawn from the ranks of ordinary people; and the ideas in the society at large about such people and their betterment in a word, liberalism, in all but the modern American sense. The market-tested betterment, the Great Enrichment,...

[VIDEO] Texas Senator and Republican presidential candidate Ted Cruz has presented his own tax plan for America. While the tax plans of the other candidates are quite impressive, Cruz’s is by far the most ambitious and pro-growth of them all. Last weekend, Cruz was given the opportunity to explain what his tax plan encompasses. The most important part of the plan is a 10% flat tax. In contrast to a so-called fair tax, a flat tax means that everybody pays the same percentage to the federal government. In his case, that’s 10% — 4.5% less than Rand Paul’s plan. Cruz’s...

I almost feel like today is a show based on the title of a Kevin Trudeau book. As a matter of fact, when he gets released from prison in 6 or 7 years, he could reinvent himself as a conservative commentator or author and write a book, "News Stories They Don't Want You To Know About." But naturally, I digress. Even without talking, I digress. It's a huge problem. Anyway, today's show deals a little bit with the Ben Carson attack and backlash, and along not necessarily those lines but along the lines of sharing stories that I feel have...

CRISFIELD, Md.—Can you have your cake and island too? The folks on Maryland’s Smith Island, tucked offshore in the Chesapeake Bay, have tried mightily to save their dwindling archipelago with a distinctive eight-to-twelve layer cake. The cakes have done great. The island, less so. Smith Islanders have long baked a cake called the Smith Island Cake, with up to a dozen pencil-thin layers of cake and frosting. And for nearly as long, the island’s economy and population have slumped—to 169 citizens at last estimate. So in 2008, state lawmakers hit on a solution: Make the cake the state dessert. On...

A strong employment report for October hasn't solved a conundrum that has persisted for five years: As jobs are created and the jobless rate falls, the number of Americans in the labor force keeps dropping. The Labor Department reported Friday that, including revisions from August and September, hiring was up a brisk 283,000 - about double the meager pace of recent months. Gains were widespread in industries, including business services, health care, retail, food services and even construction, suggesting a housing bounce. Average wages rose 0.35% to $25.20, indicating many workers got raises. We'd love to see 12 months or...

The double-digit stock-market rebound after a bruising summer has put European shares back into positive territory for the year, but sentiment around the central-bank-fueled rally remains fragile. Weak trading volumes, a so-far disappointing earnings season and a focus on reliable dividend payouts rather than blockbuster growth have all contributed to the view that investors are being sucked into a market updraft rather than enthusiastically betting on a cyclical upturn. Even with European shares getting a fresh lift from a weaker euro on Friday - after U.S. data smashed expectations and fueled bets on tighter U.S. rate policy in contrast with...

If anyone deserves to pay more to shore up the federal safety net, either through higher taxes or lower benefits, it’s boomers — the generation that was born into some of the strongest job growth in the history of America, gobbled up the best parts, and left its children and grandchildren with some bones to pick through and a big bill to pay. Politicians shouldn’t be talking about holding that generation harmless. They should be asking how future workers can claw back some of the spoils that the “Me Generation” hoarded for itself.

Ever since M. King Hubbert in the 1950s convinced a lot of people with his "peak oil" theory that production would collapse and we'd eventually exhaust our crude supplies, the clock has been running. And running. And it will continue to run for some time, as technology and new discoveries show that there's still an ocean of oil under our feet. [snip] A BP official told the magazine that "energy resources are plentiful. Concerns over running out of oil and gas have disappeared." Things are so good, in fact, that Engineering and Technology says "with the use of the innovative...

For almost 20 years, the Fraser Institute's Economic Freedom of the World report has highlighted the many benefits of economic freedom: more prosperity, faster and more sustained economic growth, higher income levels, faster reduction in poverty rates, even better air quality. The correlations between high levels of economic freedom and societal wellbeing -- and low levels of economic freedom and societal ills -- are numerous. But what struck me as I glanced at this year's color-coded cover of the report is the correlation between economic freedom and stability and peace -- and the converse correlation between a lack of economic...

Kraft Heinz To Close Seven Plants, Cut 2,600 Jobs Thu, 11/05/2015 - 9:37am Andy Szal, Digital Reporter Kraft Heinz on Wednesday announced that it will close seven facilities and cut 2,600 jobs as part of its continued efforts to reduce costs. The plan includes shuttering the nearly century-old Oscar Mayer plant in Madison, Wisconsin, which houses the company's U.S. meats business. The meats operation will instead move to Chicago along with about 250 of the plant's workforce of more than 1,000. Kraft Heinz will move its Illinois office from the former Kraft headquarters in suburban Northfield to downtown Chicago early...

As central planners the world over grapple with the effective "lower bound" that's imposed by the existence of physical banknotes, there’s been no shortage of calls for a ban on cash. Put simply, if you eliminate physical currency, you also eliminate the idea of a floor for depo rates. After all, if people can't withdraw paper money and stash it under the mattress, then interest rates can be as negative as the government wants them to be in order to "encourage" consumption. If, for instance, you’re being charged 10% for saving your money, then by God you will probably spend...