- “Help, I left my kids to wait in the car for less than five minutes, now I’m on trial for child endangerment” [Skenazy] “N.Y. State Senate Passes Bill Outlawing Kids Under 8 Waiting in Cars” [same]
- “Greek court dismisses charges against German magazine for denigrating national symbol” [AP]
- Pre-clearance for financial innovation, as with drugs and the FDA? Bad idea [Mark Calabria/Cato, The Economist, Thom Lambert]
- NYT, Reuters misreport effect of Stand Your Ground laws [Jacob Sullum, Robert VerBruggen/NRO, earlier here, etc.]
- “Attorney advises against talking to Baltimore Sun in email mistakenly sent to Baltimore Sun” [Andrew Beaujon, Poynter]
- Ken at Popehat knows how to pick his enemies [first, second, third posts, Philly Law Blog]
- “Now Can We Start Talking About the Real Foxconn?” [Tim Culpan, Bloomberg]
Posts Tagged ‘Wall Street’
Great moments in academia
Not a parody: A Columbia University course will give students credit for Occupy Wall Street activism [CBS New York]
Wall Street protests roundup
With some help from Cato colleagues:
- As bailouts go, Fannie/Freddie’s is on track to cost more than TARP [Mark Calabria; related, Arnold Kling] “Engineering the Financial Crisis: Systemic Risk and the Failure of Regulation” [Cato forum this past Thursday]
- Just like Valley Forge out there in the snow? Are you sure? [Ann Althouse]
- Student loans have become more burdensome, especially given inability to discharge in bankruptcy. Who if anyone deserves blame? [Kenneth Anderson, Kling, Mystal/Above the Law] President’s proposed student loan revamp “won’t cost taxpayers” (and if you believe that one…) [Neal McCluskey]
- NY police union rep: we’ll sue protesters if they hurt us [USA Today]
- No new graphic ideas since, what, 1893? New Yorker envisions top-hatted capitalists in whiskers [David Boaz] Some demographics behind income inequality [Mark Perry, more, yet more, Will Wilkinson (PDF), Reihan Salam, Political Calculations]
- Unions rally some protesters to intimidate businesspeople at their homes; nothing new about that except the label [CNN, Business Insider, earlier]
The dreaded “network of corporate control,” or When Mutual Funds Rule the World
Some fans of the Occupy movement, such as Cory Doctorow at BoingBoing, have been hyping a research paper alleging that 150 companies control the world economy through interlocking ownership shares. Turns out most of the leading positions in the supposed “control” network are held by… mutual fund operators and other managers of collective investment vehicles. Tyler Cowen, Yves Smith and Tim Worstall offer debunking assistance.
Prosecuting Wall Street executives
My new Cato post has a suggestion for Time magazine: how about prosecuting only the executives who’ve actually committed crimes? (& Kenneth Silber, RealClearPolitics “Best of the Blogs”). Related: Politico.
Cordray to CFPB
It appears President Obama “will nominate former Ohio Attorney General Richard Cordray to be the first director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB),” according to my colleague Mark Calabria, who recounts Cordray’s mixed record on topics of business litigation (he withdrew an abusive lawsuit against lead-paint manufacturers, while also campaigning against foreclosures). Earlier coverage here.
P.S. Daniel Fisher at Forbes reports that securities class action lawyers appear to adore Cordray, to judge from his campaign finances. John Berlau finds him inclined toward heavy-handed regulation, while Neil Munro wonders about his data privacy defense record.
“What ‘Inside Job’ got wrong”
An accusatory film about the financial crisis glides over some inconvenient complications. [Ezra Klein, Washington Post]
If only we’d had Dodd-Frank in ’08?
Magical thinking at the FDIC [David Skeel via Bainbridge]
Bigger — and more entrenched — hedge funds
That could be the result of the new institution of elaborate compliance system mandates that could prove to be beyond the capacity of fledgling start-ups, per Marc Hodak:
So, the government decided it had to increase regulations [on] the one part of the financial services sector -– hedge funds –- that had nothing to do with the financial crisis. And because the government felt compelled to spend gobs of taxpayer cash to bail out financial institution[s] that were too big to fail, Congress created a raft of regulations whose main effect will be to crush entrepreneurship and compel waves of consolidation. And the people who pushed for this regulation, who inadvertently insisted that the fixed costs of doing business in America are not yet high enough, will be shocked to find that only the big survive.
July 27 roundup
- Dodd-Frank major oops: Faced with new liabilities, agencies refuse to let their ratings be used in bond issuance [WaPo, Salmon] SEC scurries to suspend requirement for six months while it figures out what to do [Salmon]
- Left-leaning law lectern: study of newly hired lawprofs identifies 52 liberals, 8 conservatives [Caron, ABA Journal, Lindgren/Volokh]
- “Progress in protecting gripe site owners against silly trademark claims” [Levy, CL&P]
- “Congress Investigates Beck, Ingraham Advertisers” [Stoll]
- “Uncle Sam Kicks Out Legal Immigrants for Down Profits in Recession” [Shapiro, Cato]
- Judge punishes Goodyear for discovery heel-dragging by denying it chance to disprove liability in $32M case [Las Vegas Sun]
- “$2.3M verdict against Dole thrown out on fraud grounds” [PoL, background]
- Paul Campos vs. Elena Kagan: this time it’s personal [Lawyers Guns & Money]