Has Wal-Mart Buried Mom and Pop?

Has Wal-Mart Buried Mom and Pop?, PDF from the Cato Institute:

Our research suggests that the popular belief that Wal-Mart has a significant negative effect on the size of the mom-and-pop business sector of the United States economy is statistically unfounded.

After examining a plethora of different measures of small business activity and growth, examining both time series and cross-section data, and employing different geographic levels of data and different econometric techniques, it can be firmly concluded that Wal-Mart has had no significant impact on the overall size and growth of U.S. small business activity.

There is no question that Wal-Mart does cause some mom-and-pop businesses to fail. However, those failures are entirely compensated for by the entry of other new small business elsewhere in the economy through the process of creative destruction.

Nerdy financial joke

Craigslist Meets WallStreet…Classic:

Okay, I’m tired of beating around the bush. I’m a beautiful (spectacularly beautiful) 25 year old girl. I’m articulate and classy. I’m not from New York . I’m looking to get married to a guy who makes at least half a million a year. I know how that sounds, but keep in mind that a million a year is middle class in New York City, so I don’t think I’m overreaching at all.

Are there any guys who make 500K or more on this board?

(continue reading...)

mistaking the consequences for the causes

"Tom Friedman doesn't understand why America is unpopular in the world" (Glenn Greenwald):

In light of that, just ponder the self-delusion required for Tom "Suck-On-This" Friedman and the political establishment he leads to express befuddlement -- confusion -- over our extreme unpopularity in the world over the last seven years. How would a rational person expect our country to be perceived when the face we present to the world is the face that appears on that grotesque You Tube clip .... ?

more rising oil prices, and ignorant polical reaction

"The Economist" de 3 de Julio - Politicians who try to make oil cheaper by restraining speculation will just make things worse

The accusers point to the link between the volume of transactions on the futures markets and the price of oil. Since 2004 the near tripling of trading in oil on the New York Mercantile Exchange (NYMEX), the world's biggest market for the stuff, has neatly coincided with a tripling in the price.

.... neither index funds nor other speculators ever buy any physical oil. Instead, they buy futures and options which they settle with a cash payment when they fall due. In essence, these are bets on which way the oil price will move. Since the real currency of such contracts is cash, rather than barrels of crude, there is no limit to the number of bets that can be made. And since no oil is ever held back from the market, these bets do not affect the price of oil any more than bets on a football match affect the result.

Despite their dismal reputation, the oil speculators provide a vital service. They help airlines and other big oil consumers to hedge against rising prices, and so to reduce risk—a massive boon amid the economic turmoil. By the same token, they provide oil producers with more predictable future revenues, and so allow them to expand more confidently and borrow more cheaply. That, in turn, should help to lower the price of oil in the long run. Any attempt to curtail speculation, by contrast, is likely to make life harder for firms and oil more expensive.

What onions teach us about oil prices

"What onions teach us about oil prices" (CNN Money):

Onions have no futures market, yet their recent price volatility makes the swings in oil and corn look tame.

And yet even with no traders to blame, the volatility in onion prices makes the swings in oil and corn look tame, reinforcing academics' belief that futures trading diminishes extreme price swings.

about oil prices

About professor Argandoña's argument,

Si el petróleo se estuviese encareciendo como consecuencia de movimientos especulativos, veríamos, probablemente, aumentos de inventarios que, por ahora, no están a la vista. Es verdad que los productores quizás están guardando esos inventarios "en el pozo", es decir, no expandiendo su producción tanto como podrían. Pero esto no puede calificarse de especulación financiera, sino que forma parte de la manera de hacer negocios de esos productores.

This interesting article — "I Got Your Oil Inventories Right Here":

The most popular explanation for the high oil prices is that world demand is rising while supply is stagnating. But suppose that Frankel is right, and that oil producers really are leaving oil in the ground because of the low interest rates. That would mean that some of the apparent stagnation in the supply of oil is just an illusion: oil producers could be keeping up with the rising demand, but the low interest rates are inducing them to keep more oil in the ground, thereby creating the appearance of stagnating oil supply.