Jeffrey Frankel of Harvard (Financial Times): “imposing the dollar on Iraq could also feed widespread fears of US imperialism. The politics would get even trickier if, as in Argentina, the arrangement hit a crisis - for example, as a consequence of an increase in US interest rates.... My proposal for Iraq, therefore, is to...define the value of
USA Today reports that “anything goes” in the Iraqi “underground” free market, including currency traders with satellite access: “Street traders were tacitly banned under Saddam. But Alanbaki, among 300 local major currency exchangers who now set the dinar’s daily exchange rate, has about 30 reporting to him. Most official banks remain closed, so
From the Financial Times (via Drudge ): “Iraq’s recently appointed finance minister on Sunday announced a radical liberalisation of the economy, but his plans surprised US allies and were attacked by Iraqi business representatives. The laws abolished almost all curbs on foreign direct investment except in natural resources and allowed foreign
Using historical data to ”forecast” human action (points scored in a football game) from Tennessean.com : “Schwartz is also examining regressions, the same sort of predictive formulas used in economic and weather forecasting. Meteorologists predict today’s chance of rain by plugging factors into a regression equation. Looking at temperature and
David DeRosa writes on Bloomberg.com : “Iraq’s local currency, the dinar, is going to be reissued, removing from circulation banknotes carrying the picture of Saddam Hussein. Indeed that face has to go, but why shouldn’t the dinar also go? It can be replaced with the U.S. dollar.”
Money Central (MSN) on the future of money : “At the peak of the tech boom in 1999, techies raved about how cash was quickly going to become obsolete. Everyone, they said, would pay for things using cards embedded with microprocessor chips -- be it at the dry cleaners, the soda machine or the hotdog vendor. The hype was enough to propel some 2.2
More economic reasoning from the New York Times : “Done right, foreign aid can create legions of new consumers for American goods and services. When new roads are built in sub-Saharan Africa, for example, demand is stimulated for cars, trucks and everything they carry — all of which could be supplied by American businesses. But no single business
The Middle East Online, UK reports: “The US-led administration in Iraq is set to phase out the New Iraqi Dinar introduced in 1991 and bearing the image of deposed president Saddam Hussein, an official involved in the project said Monday.” “The currency is to be replaced by the so-called Swiss Dinar, in circulation for nearly 50 years until
Although Debts Could Swallow Up Tax Cut Cash , Scott Weigum, 33, a chemistry teacher from Bismarck, N.D. says, “If you’re a team player, you say (Bush) is doing this to stimulate the economy. So you take the ball and run with it.”
The Economist says American banks “are raking in record profits,” due in part to luck, easy money and high property prices. Of course, Dr. Guido Hulsmann reminds us that “the only permanent beneficiaries of fractional reserve banking are the bankers themselves, who are protected by market-entry and other regulations, and various governments,
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The Mises Institute is a non-profit organization that exists to promote teaching and research in the Austrian School of economics, individual freedom, honest history, and international peace, in the tradition of Ludwig von Mises and Murray N. Rothbard.
Non-political, non-partisan, and non-PC, we advocate a radical shift in the intellectual climate, away from statism and toward a private property order. We believe that our foundational ideas are of permanent value, and oppose all efforts at compromise, sellout, and amalgamation of these ideas with fashionable political, cultural, and social doctrines inimical to their spirit.