FLG Would Be Remiss

If he didn't wish everybody a Happy International Talk Like A Pirate Day!

Arrr!

Time Horizons: iPhone Edition

Paul Krugman says that if you believe the new iPhone will boos the economy, then you are a Keynesian.  Here's his argument:

The crucial thing to understand here is that these likely short-run [economic] benefits from the new phone have almost nothing to do with how good it is — with how much it improves the quality of buyers’ lives or their productivity. Such effects will kick in only over the longer run. Instead, the reason JPMorgan believes that the iPhone 5 will boost the economy right away is simply that it will induce people to spend more. 

And to believe that more spending will provide an economic boost, you have to believe — as you should — that demand, not supply, is what’s holding the economy back.

 Needless to say, FLG believes that there's a huge difference the almost secondary short run economic boost created when millions of individuals making millions of decisions to buy a product that they expect will improve their life in the long run and the government, through its messy political and bureaucratic process to spend a bunch of money.

A Conversation

Miss FLG Maior:  Daddy! Whose house?

FLG:  What?

Miss FLG Maior:  No!  When I say, "Whose house?" you say, "Run's House!"  Whose house?

FLG:  Run's house?

Miss FLG Maior:  You know what time it is.

FLG:  You really are my daughter.

Miss FLG Maior:  Whose house?

FLG Cannot Believe This

A grand for a Charlie Brown sweater?

Quick Round-Up

So, summer has unofficially ended and FLG thought it might be time to dust off the old keyboard.  Here's a quick round-up:

1) FLG is still looking for a job, but things are good.
2) FLG believes the European crisis will be well-rested after its extended vacation on the Côte d'Azur and should be causing trouble soon.
3) FLG was shocked to notice the other night, because it is so very obvious once one does notice, that Obama's right shoulder drops a lot, FLG might even say freakishly, lower than his left.
4) FLG made a note today to send Helen Rittelmeyer bourbon.  One needs to drink down under.  Everything is fucking deadly down there.  Deadliest snake, deadliest sharks, deadliest spiders, deadliest dingos, deadliest feral cats, deadliest boomerangs.  Plus, there's the constant worry about falling off the fucking planet.  Common sense dictates that the entire continent is in a very precarious gravitational well of some sort.