DooDiligence

Comment by the author, "Until an actual bill is passed there's no way to know how it will be gamed, but there will certainly be attempts to do so. Most derivative obligations will include the tax in their pricing (selling a derivative abroad and hedging it will result in the purchasing of a US dollar asset by a foreign account), so that shouldn't be a problem. more likely is the development of a secondary market abroad for ownership in short-term US assets, but this is probably something the regulators can figure out. Capital controls are never perfect, after all, but they can nonetheless be effective." "It could make reserve management more complex, but the Fed can easily cut deals with individual central banks in cases in which it does not believe the central bank is manipulating the currency, or is willing to allow it." "Unless you believe in a mysterious and beneficent god that manages every country's trade and capital accounts so skillfully that they are always and exactly in balance, Dan, then there must be a direction in which causality flows. My point is that those who argue that trade accounts are always where the primary imbalances lie, and capital accounts simply balance trade, which is what most people assume, are simply assuming an obsolete condition. This is nowhere implied in the accounting identity. In which case you should ask yourself: do you really believe that international capital flows mostly consist of trade finance?" "As for whether limiting capital inflows will drive up interest rates, that is easy to test. Just look at the relationship between US interest rates and the US current account deficit. If you believe reduced capital inflows should raise interest rates, then you would expect that higher current account deficits are always associated with lower interest rates." "Here is a comment I made elsewhere to someone who is sympathetic to this idea but thinks it works by weakening the dollar, which worries him: "A lot of people believe that a tax on capital inflows works by weakening the dollar, Marshall, but I think that’s a mistake. It works by forcing up the US savings rate or, more technically, by preventing capital inflows from forcing down the US savings rate. While causing the dollar to appreciate is one of the ways capital inflows force down the US savings rate, I think it is among the least important. As an example, consider how German capital flows after 2004-05 affected Spain, Italy, Greece, France, etc. The euro prevented any currency adjustment, and yet savings in all of those countries collapsed in an explosion of debt and wealth effects driven by asset bubbles. To me the main impact of an American tax on capital inflows is to reduce American reliance on household and fiscal debt to drive growth."" --- I'll stop here as it's probably better to read these in context with comments other than the authors.

Nonsense. What a bunch of bollocks. Not only the US does not need it to "finance its deficit" it should tax capital inflows. If treasuries are sold, either there's no impact on the US or there's a positive impact. Either that or all the surplus countries, including Germany and Japan increase local demand via adjusting local regulation (this is the reason for the imbalances, suppression of local demand via local regulation). This is not going to happen, of course, any time soon. Once again, in plain English. Since this remains an open-ended question, in relation to the chicken and egg confusion, here goes. Does the trade imbalance come from the rest of the relevant world saving too much and not consuming enough (saving glut, Bernanke 2005 ®) and therefore dependent on the ultimate currency or does it come from the US consuming too much and not saving enough and therefore dependent on the rest of the relevant world to finance the private and public deficits? This is a bilateral dependency but my take is that it is not symmetric (in terms of causes and outcomes) and I side with SD on this one because I think meiroy falls into the now widely defined trap of focusing on the financial aspect of a transaction over the substance of a transaction. In plain English, here's a biased example that hopefully may help. Let's say one has developed a consumer dependency of some kind, let's say an opioid dependence. Let's assume that one has entered the stage where one consumes more than one earns, and one represents the biggest client of the dealer who, somehow, has to accept one's currency and where the dealer has lent one back the currency in order to allow one to continue to consume and the situation has reached a stage where it is felt that the consumption trend is unsustainable. How to deal with this? -The tariff solution Someone figures that the best way to curb the inflow of the currency is to point a finger and to make the drug more expensive. -The meiroy international tax on capital inflows Someone figures that you could point a finger and unilaterally devalue the currency once it has been spent. -Me thinks that diving interest rates will help to extend and pretend but one should do a root cause analysis and deal with the internal saving-consumption imbalance. In all fairness and to balance the biased example above, some 'analysts' whom I respect a lot tend to agree with meiroy. https://carnegieendowment.org/chinafinancialmarkets/79641 The Carnegie article is very interesting. I had never thought about the effects of inflows. I feel like there's a very influential human factor which also contributes to the low US savings rate. We are constantly being sold to & our hot buttons have been pushed so hard that they are stuck. "You'll be happy if you buy, buy, buy." I constantly feel the need to buy a bunch of crap but, like many here on CoBF, have developed a filter and prefer the "feel good" of saving over consumption. CNBC & the like are constantly pushing a similar set of buttons with, so called, investors. "Can't stand still. Bye bye savings." I've mentioned Frederic Pohl's "Midas World" before & believe it's the best satirical illustration of consumerism run amuck. --- Back to the Carnegie piece. If we restrict capital inflow, China will invest heavily in Brasil or India, for example, & create another huge consumption based economy? Seems to me that if China were to keep more capital in their own economy they would accomplish the same thing at home, yes? Why don't they do this? --- My limited understanding inclines me towards the authors arguments in favor of restricting inflows but I do not believe the present administration would understand the authors proposals. They don't present any obvious pain points & he seems to enjoy inflicting pain.

Nonsense. What a bunch of bollocks. Not only the US does not need it to "finance its deficit" it should tax capital inflows. If treasuries are sold, either there's no impact on the US or there's a positive impact. Either that or all the surplus countries, including Germany and Japan increase local demand via adjusting local regulation (this is the reason for the imbalances, suppression of local demand via local regulation). This is not going to happen, of course, any time soon. Once again, in plain English.

translates to : [ ; - ) ] - - - o 0 o - - - I bought it first time in January 2013, then added in 2014, 2015 & 2017. EBVAT/share just continues every year to go up, up, up. What I especially like about it is that I've never received bad news from the company. I just read the company announcements as they come [mostly about new acquisitions or disposals], look at the quarterly financials and the annual report to see if there's any dividend coming my way, most of the year ends the answer is "No", and then I think : "Fine, please just keep my money". Street food is the best.

You must be talking about Xi.

http://mastersinvest.com/new-page-16/ https://buffett.cnbc.com/warren-buffett-archive/ 3rd link's a charm http://www.austinvaluecapital.com/resources.html

Crap :-\ Goats, cows & pigs are friggin' delicious but I couldn't eat a friend. Might have to go to chicken only. Please don't post a lovable chicken link. Chickens are great! Our chickens used to jump on our laps and follow us around. One of them was so lovable my kids used to call her lovebird. If you raise them as chicks and hold them a lot they grow up liking to be held. When you get them a little older they just run away from people. All animals have "personalities". If it makes you feel better there was one chicken we had that was such a jerk we hated her and all the other chickens did too. She was a bully and would boss all the others around. The other chickens eventually rebelled. One morning we found Ofelia (that was her name) with no feathers, because all of the other chickens had plucked her nude overnight. Then they started not letting her in the chicken house, there was always at least 2 chickens guarding the entrance 24/7 so that she couldn't get in. She would go into the woods to sleep outside and we'd try to find her before dark and put her in the chicken house. One day we couldn't find her and we never saw her again. Jeez, a guy could starve to death. http://www.eatplantsdrinkbeer.com/readup/2017/9/7/plants-have-feelings-too Does anyone have an opinion on whether dirt is cute? To live is to kill. IKEA conducts bullying experiment on plants — the results are shocking https://globalnews.ca/news/4217594/bully-a-plant-ikea/ Screw it, I'm making bacon cheeseburgers tonight. Me too! Only I'm going to throw a fried egg on mine in memory of Ofelia . ;D ;D ;D

Crap :-\ Goats, cows & pigs are friggin' delicious but I couldn't eat a friend. Might have to go to chicken only. Please don't post a lovable chicken link. Chickens are great! Our chickens used to jump on our laps and follow us around. One of them was so lovable my kids used to call her lovebird. If you raise them as chicks and hold them a lot they grow up liking to be held. When you get them a little older they just run away from people. All animals have "personalities". If it makes you feel better there was one chicken we had that was such a jerk we hated her and all the other chickens did too. She was a bully and would boss all the others around. The other chickens eventually rebelled. One morning we found Ofelia (that was her name) with no feathers, because all of the other chickens had plucked her nude overnight. Then they started not letting her in the chicken house, there was always at least 2 chickens guarding the entrance 24/7 so that she couldn't get in. She would go into the woods to sleep outside and we'd try to find her before dark and put her in the chicken house. One day we couldn't find her and we never saw her again. Jeez, a guy could starve to death. http://www.eatplantsdrinkbeer.com/readup/2017/9/7/plants-have-feelings-too Does anyone have an opinion on whether dirt is cute? To live is to kill. IKEA conducts bullying experiment on plants — the results are shocking https://globalnews.ca/news/4217594/bully-a-plant-ikea/ Screw it, I'm making bacon cheeseburgers tonight.

How do you reverse a brainwashed, irrational electorate?

Crap :-\ Goats, cows & pigs are friggin' delicious but I couldn't eat a friend. Might have to go to chicken only. Please don't post a lovable chicken link. Chickens are great! Our chickens used to jump on our laps and follow us around. One of them was so lovable my kids used to call her lovebird. If you raise them as chicks and hold them a lot they grow up liking to be held. When you get them a little older they just run away from people. All animals have "personalities". If it makes you feel better there was one chicken we had that was such a jerk we hated her and all the other chickens did too. She was a bully and would boss all the others around. The other chickens eventually rebelled. One morning we found Ofelia (that was her name) with no feathers, because all of the other chickens had plucked her nude overnight. Then they started not letting her in the chicken house, there was always at least 2 chickens guarding the entrance 24/7 so that she couldn't get in. She would go into the woods to sleep outside and we'd try to find her before dark and put her in the chicken house. One day we couldn't find her and we never saw her again. Jeez, a guy could starve to death. http://www.eatplantsdrinkbeer.com/readup/2017/9/7/plants-have-feelings-too Does anyone have an opinion on whether dirt is cute?

Politicians aren't subject to insider trading laws and their portfolios returns regularly do better than the average retail investor. Go figure. >:( >:( >:(

Crap :-\ Goats, cows & pigs are friggin' delicious but I couldn't eat a friend. Might have to go to chicken only. Please don't post a lovable chicken link.

Why should he quit shitposting when it's great for his private account. Short & cover, short & cover, short & cover. I'll bet he's levered to the hilt.

Nah, they're used to seeing Trump file for BK :-\

When will people start caring about US budget deficit again? When their own personal deficits become unendurable. --- I don't even know why I bother setting budgets & balancing my accounts.

True & a perfect example of how much smoke & mirrors get used in politics.

I think the issue of cramming algebra to kids who are not interested in it is relatively minor in the education picture (although still important). The much bigger issue is teaching kids who have little to no background/motivation/parental supervision/parental role models/peer support/supporting environment/etc. skills that would allow them to make something productive from their lives. Possibly to ambivalent or even hostile kids. This is very hard to do and it's not surprising that even best intentions and programs don't work (like Bill Gates discovered). I think it depends on where you are at, which school district, and sometimes even the school. As was highlighted in the article link by LC, there are NUMEROUS children (and families & culture) who do not value education. Some might say that they are even hostile towards education. So why force them to do something they don't want/appreciate? Society is spending billions & Billions & BILLIONS on this. Why not make education voluntary? Promote it, work with community leaders, run PSA announcements like "Mr. T says Don't be a FOOL, STAY IN SCHOOL!". Let ANYBODY who wants an education in the system. Work to educate them to the best of their capability to learn. HOWEVER, the student has a duty to be reasonably well behaved, show up the vast majority of the time, attempt to do the work to the best of their ability, and so on. If they mis-behave or don't want to be there, that is fine. If a child mis-behaves, they are EITHER out of the system OR if the parent consents, they will be disciplined and if the behavior is bad enough, they are sent to remedial classes where they will dealt with appropriately. If the child & parents don't care, why should we? Why should burn precious capital in a futile gesture? Perhaps most importantly of all, why should we allow trouble makers to sabotage OTHER children's education? Change is desperately needed! What about the children who are mis-behaving because their home life is a catastrophe and their parents don't care about them or their education? What responsibility, if any, does society at large (via its government) have towards those children? Should public schools be, in part, an effort to try to help those children overcome the handicap of parents who don't care? Or should we just wash our hands of them? I'm no education expert, but I agree that more money probably won't help teach someone who doesn't want to learn. I believe it's in our best interest to make an effort because otherwise these future losers will be a drag on all of us, whether through crime or going on the dole or being charismatic enough to get a job & then being extremely crappy at it. It's like healthcare. A healthy, competent & motivated populace is better for all of us (in the US & the entire world). I also really think that elements of philosophy & psychology should weigh in as well in an attempt to try & get youngsters to understand the difference between reality & delusion so they don't grow up to be mouth breathing Fox news sheeple. Many will never get it but that's humanity.

The Burger King down the road from my house has had this exact sign out front for months now.

@ DooDiligence- I just want to tend to my cash flow. =) @ JayGatsby- How passive was it? I think we expect to visit the shop once a week at the beginning (for 6 hours), then eventually drop down to once 3-4 weeks. Not sure if this is the right expectation. From what I understand, no small business is really an absentee business, even though the broker markets it as such. Seems like a pretty easy business to passively run. --- I had a DUI around 15 years ago (never again) & was required to have a DUI interlock device installed on my vehicle for 1 year after my license was reinstated. This required a visit to a small garage facility once every month to have records downloaded from the device (how many times the vehicle was started & the results from every request for a breath test from the device). The tech would also reset & calibrate the device. The cost was around $90 US per month plus a one time installation & removal fee. I had to drive an hour to the nearest shop (every month) & they had people wrapped around the building to get serviced. --- I looked at a few device manufacturers & have listed 1 below, https://www.guardianinterlock.com/about-us/guardian-provider/ I was amazed at how many times a visitor being serviced would be told by the tech that they had blown a few positives & would be getting a notice from the probation officer of a violation of probation (people can be idiots). Now that I've started thinking about this again, I am going to look into doing this in my area. Not saying it'll happen but if I'm going to wind up playing in bars over the next few years, I will be meeting a lot of prospective clients.

How about an idea with a larger addressable market? DUI interlock devices.

Plenty of arguments here in favor of abortion remaining legal.

Personally, I think the whole readin', writin' & 'rithmatic model needs to change. Up until 2nd grade, kids learn to read & then they read to learn. Basic numeracy shuld be related to real life (finance, budgets, understanding measurements). After that, students should be evaluated for what they have a facility for & encouraged to learn the things that they enjoy. If a kid likes solving math problems, put them on a heavy math track. Same for science, history, writing, music, etc. These could all lead into the various disciplines associated with the basic skill sets. I know this is an oversimplification of a difficult task in creating individualised syllabuses but I don't believe that cramming algebra down a kids throat when they are clearly more interested in liberal arts (and vice versa) will motivate anyone.

I've had other students ask me to read papers they've written & all I can say is damn. Anyone who has to read some of that crap & give it a grade & write in critical notes, deserves to be compensated. All joking aside, the exams we have to take for my major are not simple multiple choice & the instructors have a lot of work on their hands when grading them. Not to mention the difficulty of conveying the concepts to students throughout the semesters. The attrition rate is high & we just lost half our class going into the 3rd semester so it does become a bit easier for the instructor. We can & should be criticical of our educational systems, but a lot of the criticism should be directed at uninvolved parents who send their little poorly disciplined snowflakes to school expecting some miracle to happen. Either way, the US & Canada have done pretty well & will continue to do so as our educational systems slowly evolve for better & for worse.

Fingers crossed that Omaha will receive interest payments for borrowing! That'd be a new twist on loan sharking. Next stop Europe?

Does anyone believe that WEB might be giving us every opportunity to buy for our own accounts before he goes on a tear?