Consumer Confidence at Highest Level Since January 2008, Largest 6-Month Gain in 15 Years - Mark Perry Carpe Diem Blog

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Can You Spend Your Way Out of Recession? - “You can’t spend your way out of recession” is a sound bite heard almost every day on financial TV. Recently a guest commentator combined that sound bite with this one: “You can’t borrow your way out of debt.” Perhaps the second one was intended to divert our attention from the first one. Clever. Perhaps too clever by half. - Bob McTeer Blog

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How to run your economy into the ground: a lesson from Venezuela - What happens when you mix irresponsible borrowing and spending policies with a socialist government that is hostile to private enterprise? Then you impose exchange controls to keep the currency from collapsing. Throw on top of that a nasty dictator who disregards the constitution and you get a real mess. The answer is, you get Venezuela (although you may have been thinking of something else). ... All the money printing and currency controls actually do have some consequences. And they are not pretty. The chart below shows Venezuela's inflation rate compared with Colombia, Peru, and even Argentina. ... - Sober Look Blog

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Name Your Poison - David Merkel - lots of good points -  ... "The only question is whether it ends in inflation or greater taxation.  Name your poison." ... - The Aleph Blog