HICKS: General Assembly puts foolishness on display
We need the remaining month of this Legislature to look a lot less like the last month.
Economic Analysis
Articles
HICKS: Debt a bigger problem than who bought it
purchasing our debt and being our banker are different matters altogether.
HICKS: Education reform deserves bipartisan support
The goal of the legislation is to give public schools more incentives to improve.
HICKS: Unfortunately, veteran tuition benefits must be cut
It’s a wide entitlement program that will literally explode in the coming decades, since a third of all combat veterans will meet the disability requirements. It is not sustainable, and the Senate just tightened the requirements.
HICKS: Telecom reform in Indiana worked
Deregulation of monopolies tends to almost always make consumers better off. Indiana’s broad and effective telecommunications reform of 2006 is a classic example of this.
HICKS: Uncertainty always leads to oil-price fluctuations
Being a commodity, changes to oil prices are frequent and instantaneous. Changes to supply or demand of petroleum in the Middle East affect the price at the pump in the Midwest within hours.
HICKS: Productivity gains make for jobless recovery
It is an old story, but a nevertheless disheartening one. It is also a tale rich in its implications for young workers.
HICKS: Trimming government fat tough, but necessary
Recognizing inefficiency in government is far more difficult than rhetoric suggests. The private sector has the blessing of the profits to guide decisions.
HICKS: Deciphering economy a confusing pursuit
A casual observer of news about economic indicators has more than enough reason to be puzzled.
HICKS: President should focus on reducing debt burden
What worried me most about the president’s speech was not what he said, but what he didn’t.
HICKS: Economist job more exciting than most think
Recently, my wife has stopped calling me an economist. It is too hard to explain what I do, so she calls me a professor (which has far more cool points to Harry Potter or Gilligan’s Island fans).
HICKS: Why economic forecasting is inexact science
Forecasts are primarily used as a tool to begin, not end, conversations about business and government matters.
HICKS: Let’s fight poverty, but also keep it in perspective
There is a certain poignant irony in the U.S. Census Bureau’s release of 2010 poverty statistics this Christmas week. It reminds us that, behind the green eyeshades of professional data collectors, the folks at the Census Bureau have an acute marketing sense.
HICKS: Inflation delays visit, but it’ll arrive eventually
All economists know that, at its core, inflation is caused solely by too much money chasing too few goods.
HICKS: Tax-cut proposal probably a good compromise
The Bush tax cuts in particular are politically charged. Many people want to see the rich taxed at higher rates, with little regard for the impact on the economy.
HICKS: The high costs of an over-lawyered society
Estimates of the private-sector costs of civil litigation top out at about 2 percent of our gross domestic product, so for every $50 spent in the United States, $1 goes to support legal costs and settlements.
HICKS: Thanksgiving, Black Friday and Cyber Monday
The holiday season in the United States has morphed into a time of concentrated purchases.
HICKS: Discounting the future when making public policy
As you will learn in any good high school economics class, everyone values the future less than the present.
HICKS: Educators must acknowledge need for reform
Fixing schools won’t be easy, but it begins with an honest realization of the problem—not mendacious malarkey.
HAUKE: Stock market, as usual, gets it right again
I’ve noticed a growing number of experts who are confused and confounded by the rising stock market. They refuse to believe what their eyes are telling them…