The Post-Partisan Emporium

  The Easy Money Fairy Tale Is About To End Violently Truth, consequences and pain are on their way. And to the best of what I can tell, no one is prepared psychologically. Quoth the Raven For the better part of the last couple years, I have wondered whether financial markets are permanently broken . Not simply overvalued or temporarily irrational, but actually broken at the mechanical level and permanently distorted. I’ve written about it . The basic process that is supposed to make capitalism work goes like this. Capital flows toward good ole’ fashioned productive uses (like the George Foreman Grill™) and away from flashy hot-shit stupid ones (like the Apple Vision Pro ). Good businesses eventually outperform bad ones. Fraud eventually gets exposed. Making money is the point of a business. Price is a rationing mechanism and is determined by free markets. This system appears to have been dead for the last 10 years, at least. Nowadays, we function under a derivative of capitalism (...

  Jack Welch, financialization, and the true force behind US deindustrialization Watch the video clips of 3 apostles of capitalism at the end, one unfortunately was not fictional Hua Bi N When I studied business in the mid-90s, there was no company more revered than General Electric and no CEO more respected than Jack Welch. For years, GE was honored as the most admired company in the world and was the most valuable by market cap. Jack Welch was the idol corporate chieftain case-studied in every business school and emulated by aspiring “corporate leaders”. He pioneered “the GE Way”. GE had an array of world leading businesses from aircraft engines, turbines, health care, NBC, Universal Studios, to refrigerators and light bulbs. GE Finance led in aircraft leasing and financing of capital goods produced by GE’s industrial units. GE executives were widely courted as corporate superstars. When Welch retired in 2001 and Jeff Immelt took over as CEO, several frontrunners to succeed Welch...