This morning, Rutgers University released its Labor Scorecard, which confirmed the high unemployment figures published by the Labor Department earlier this week. Someone in the PR department at Rutgers caught this report on its way out the door and added a little spice to the press release, noting that “though unemployment has risen in 2009 to its highest rate in 26 years, all is not gloom and doom for America’s workers on Labor Day…average inflation-adjusted earnings have actually increased for those still collecting paychecks.”
Why do wages rise in a recession?
Posted in Money Tagged economics, great depression, Labor Day, recession, salary, unemployment, wages, working class 1 Comment
How is a stock like an equity bond?
Warren Buffett described his philosophy of viewing stocks as ‘equity bonds’ in a 1977 Forbes magazine article and subsequently in a speech at Columbia Business School. In her book, Warren Buffett and the Interpretation of Financial Statements, Mary Buffett attributes the concept to Buffett, which is interesting considering that the title of her book is a nod to an earlier work by the true father of that philosophy.
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Risk: an unconventional approach
The comedian Robert “Bobcat” Goldthwaite had a routine about bad ideas, like the day someone decided to cook with an open flame on the Hindenburg. Or, in all seriousness, someone decided that it was a good idea to board an airship attached to a giant ball of flammable gas. What drives humans to make such stupid mistakes? Economists think it has something to do with commonly held misconceptions about risk or, as Bobcat might put it, mass brain-damage.
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