Employment

[30ashopper]

Interesting post today on the econobrowser blog on employment:

Yes, 31% of respondents do say that sales are their "biggest problem." That number hasn't budged much over the last year. But two numbers have changed a bit more than that-- 21% of respondents list taxes as their biggest problem up from 18% a year ago. And 15% list government regulations and red tape as their biggest problem, up from 11%. In fact, if there had been one category called "Taxes and Government Regulations" it might have been seen as the biggest problem, listed by 36% of respondents, up from 29% in the year before and surpassing sales as the biggest problem.

Econbrowser: What's holding back employment growth?

The gist: uncertainty over tax and regulation policy play a signifigant role in small business hiring.

 

[Here4Good]

Go read this, just to read the comments posted to the blog. You remember the old saying, "If you laid all of the economists in the world end to end, they still wouldn't reach a conclusion"? Imagine a blog where all of the commenters are either professional or amateur economists. You will start to understand why there's no consensus not only on what needs to be done, but on what is actually happening right now.

The commenters do raise the point that this analysis throws out the last 30 years as "distracting".

 

[30ashopper]

Go read this, just to read the comments posted to the blog. You remember the old saying, "If you laid all of the economists in the world end to end, they still wouldn't reach a conclusion"? Imagine a blog where all of the commenters are either professional or amateur economists. You will start to understand why there's no consensus not only on what needs to be done, but on what is actually happening right now.

The commenters do raise the point that this analysis throws out the last 30 years as "distracting".

That's what makes it such a great blog.

 

[Here4Good]

I like it - there are great comments that go beyond the usual "Oh yeah? You too!" sort of thing.