seanreilly

Warren Buffett

People thought it was good news a few years back when housing starts – the supply side of the picture – were running about two million annually. But household formations – the demand side – only amounted to about 1.2 million. After a few years of such imbalances, the country unsurprisingly ended up with far too many houses.

There were three ways to cure this overhang: (1) blow up a lot of houses, a tactic similar to the destruction of autos that occurred with the “cash-for-clunkers” program; (2) speed up household formations by, say, encouraging teenagers to cohabitate, a program not likely to suffer from a lack of volunteers or; (3) reduce new housing starts to a number far below the rate of household formations.

Our country has wisely selected the third option, which means that within a year or so residential housing problems should largely be behind us

the left: objects to their tax dollars being used to kill people

the right: objects to their tax dollars being used to save people

it is not complicated

…or so says his campaign. Just ignore the fact that RIM, the company that makes the blackberry, is Canadian.

Blinking Mooses with Lipstick

If you haven’t already seen it, check out the Washington Post’s graph showing how McCain and Obama’s tax plans compare, broken down into income groups. If you make under $111,645 per year then you will get a bigger tax cut from Obama. If you make less than $226,981 per year then you get a tax cut from Obama, but a slightly larger one from McCain. If you make more than $603,403 per year… I don’t imagine you’re worried too much about money. The WP sums it up nicely:

Obama’s plan gives the biggest cuts to those who make the least, while McCain would give the largest cuts to the very wealthy.