Brussels to Sanction Budget Rule Breakers
The European Commission proposes to enact severe sanctions for eurozone members that are in violation of its budget rules.
Fiscal Issues
Republicans Pledge to Rein in Spending, Somehow
All Sunday morning talks shows devote time to discussing the upcoming congressional elections.
Defense Spending Remains Difficult to Cut
For all Robert Gates’ efforts, Congress is still reluctant to reduce military spending.
Spending Cuts Ahead for UK Armed Forces
Britain has to cut and it has to cut dearly. Along with tax hikes, the new Liberal-Conservative government is preparing to slash public spending across the board in order to restore balance to the budget. The armed forces, having suffered budget cut after budget cut in the preceding years, won’t manage to escape this renewed […]
On Tax Relief and Deficit Reduction
Democrats don’t understand how Republicans can favor tax cuts while they claim to worry about the deficit.
G20 Set to Cut Deficits Despite Obama
World leaders ignore Barack Obama’s call for stimulus and commit to cutting their deficits instead.
Cameron Defends Emergency Budget
Chancellor of the Exchequer George Osborne delivered his first budget last week, outlining his plans to “balance the books” by 2016. Tax increases and benefit cuts are tough but “unavoidable,” said Osborne. Britian’s coalition government of Conservatives and Liberal Democrats will raise the main value-added tax rate from 17.5 to 20 percent next year. Taxes […]
Democrats Fail to Introduce Budget
Well past their April deadline, House Democrats have yet to introduce a federal budget for the next fiscal year.
Tax Relief for Japanese Business
A corporate tax cut would improve Japan’s competitiveness among industrialized nations.
Europe Ponders Tougher Budget Rules
Europe’s finance ministers agreed last week to review each other’s national budgets in the future to prevent one or several member states from imperiling the stability of the common currency as happened in Greece this April. The move may end being a step in the right direction but little more than that. The finance chiefs […]
Europe Braces for Spending Cuts
While the Greek debt crisis and subsequent decline of the euro continue to worry investors around the world, the people of Europe are preparing for severe austerity measures, and not just in the troubled south. With hundreds of billions of euros pledged to stabilize the common currency, European leaders are forced to make major cutbacks […]
Government Spending Didn’t End the Great Depression
Given that our country is mired in a severe recession, the history of the Great Depression — especially the history of how we got out of it — is rightly regarded as relevant to fixing today’s problems. Some popular accounts would have us believe that the Great Depression ended via a) FDR’s New Deal and/or […]
Paul Ryan’s Radicalism
Congressman Paul Ryan of Wisconsin stubbornly persists in his crusade for free-market capitalism though criticism of his “Roadmap for America’s Future” is fierce. In February, Office of Management and Budget Director Peter Orszag deconstructed Ryan’s plans, stating that although they address long-term fiscal problems, many lawmakers might find them “objectionable” because, as Politico put it, […]
Bubbles, Deficits and European Arrogance
Excessive government spending, nor European integration, is responsible for Greece’s debt crisis.
Just How Much Debt Are We In?
After The New York Times revealed on Saturday that Wall Street banks helped Greece keep its mounting debt off the books for many years, Edward Hugh at A Firstful of Euros explains how shady financial constructions allowed several European governments to hide part of their financial trouble. Eurostat, the EU’s agency for statistics, has been […]