How to Get Ahead in Today’s Economy

Posted on May 11, 2018 by MN Gordon

This week brought forward more evidence that we are living in a fabricated world.  The popular storyline presents a world of pure awesomeness.  The common experience, however, grossly falls short.

On Tuesday, for example, the Labor Department reported there were a record 6.6 million job openings in March.  Based on the Labor Department’s data, there were enough jobs available – exactly – for the 6.6 million Americans who were actively looking for a job.  What a remarkable feat!

In fact, this is the first time there’s been a job opening for every unemployed person since the Labor Department began keeping track of job openings nearly 20 years ago.  Chris Rupkey, chief financial economist at MUFG Union Bank, took one look at the jobs and labor report and exclaimed: “The labor market is literally on fire it is so hot with job openings!”

Now, obviously, not every person is qualified for every job.  A person’s skills often don’t match up with those required for a certain job.  This may be why the unemployment rate’s 3.9 percent, not 0.0 percent. Continue reading →

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Full Faith and Credit in Counterfeit Money

Posted on May 4, 2018 by MN Gordon

There are nooks and corners in every city where talk is cheap and scandal is honorable.  The Alley, in Downtown Los Angeles, is a magical place where shrewd entrepreneurs, shameless salesmen, and downright hucksters coexist in symbiotic disharmony.  Fakes, fugazis, and knock-offs galore, pack the roll-up storefronts with sparkle and shimmer.

Several weeks ago, the LAPD seized $700,000 worth of counterfeit cosmetics from 21 different Alley businesses.  Apparently, some of the bogus makeup products – which were packaged to look like trendy brands MAC, NARS, Kyle Cosmetics, and more – were found to contain human and animal excrement.

“The best price is not always the best deal!” remarked Police Captain Marc Reina via Twitter.  Did you hear that, General Electric shareholders?

Yet the Alley, for all its dubious bustle, offers a useful public service.  It provides an efficient calibration for the greater world at large; a world that’s less upright and truthful than an honest man could ever self-prepare for.  In 30-seconds or less, the Alley will impart several essential lessons: Continue reading →

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The Oil Curse Comes to Washington

Posted on April 27, 2018 by MN Gordon

Prices rise and prices fall.  So, too, they fall and rise.  This is how the supply and demand sweet spot is continually discovered – and rediscovered.

When supply exceeds demand for a good or service, prices fall.  Conversely, when demand exceeds supply, prices rise.  Producers use the information communicated by changing prices to make business decisions.  High demand and rising prices inform them to increase output.  Excess supply and falling prices inform them to taper back production.

This, in basic terms, is how markets work to efficiently bring products and services to market.  Five year plans, command and control pricing systems, and government price edicts cannot hold a candle to open market pricing.  But not all markets are created equal.  The market for gumballs or garbage bags, for instance, is much simpler than the market for solar panels or jet engines.

What we mean is some markets are subject to more government intervention than others; especially, if there’s a large money stream that can be extracted by government coercion.  Sometimes governments nationalize an entire market – for the good of the people, of course. Continue reading →

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From Fake Boom to Real Bust

Posted on April 20, 2018 by MN Gordon

More is revealed with each passing day.  You can count on it.  But what exactly the ‘more is of’ requires careful discrimination.  Is the ‘more’ merely more noise?  Or is it something of actual substance?  Today we endeavor to pass judgement, on your behalf.

For example, here in the land of fruits and nuts, things are whacky, things are zany.  Last month, State Senator, Dick Pan, introduced Senate Bill (SB) 1424, which would require California based websites to utilize fact checkers to verify news stories prior to publishing them.  Who exactly these fact checkers would be – the moral servants that would save the world from the ills of fake news – was conveniently missing from the bill.

Ironically, the control freaks in California state government can’t control themselves; they want to muck around with people’s lives unconditionally.  Nonetheless, screwball proposals like this out of Sacramento fall into the mere noise category – for now.  We estimate it will take another Presidential election cycle, or two, before such nonsense is taken seriously by the majority of state lawmakers. Continue reading →

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