As IF Times

link Vacationing a human right, EU chief says.

Finally, some civility.  After thousands of years of human suffering, work and achievment, society has finally reached the point where everyone can consume the fruits of generations of labour.  Adding vacation rights as a human right is a milestone in man’s history.  It turns out that the Judeo-Christian ethic of hard work to build a life was errant all these years.  Hedonism is the new rising altar of worship.  Here is the proposal,

“…The plan — just who gets to enjoy the travel package has yet to be determined — would see taxpayers footing some of the vacation bill for seniors, youths between the ages of 18 and 25, disabled people, and families facing “difficult social, financial or personal” circumstances. The disabled and elderly can also be accompanied by one other person. The EU and its taxpayers are slated to fund 30% of the cost of these tours, which could range from youth exploring abandoned factories and power plants in Manchester to retirees taking discount trips to Madrid, all in the name of cultural appreciation…”

People in the spoiled elite and working middle class have always enjoyed lazy summer days on the continent or just shady people watching in on the sunny coast of Monaco.  Now that rights will finally be accorded to those less financially endowed, everyone can partake in the niceties of life.  We assume that this egalitarian initiative will apply to everyone in Europe only so the unfortunates not living in any of the EU states will have to do with snapshots from friends on the  inside. 

Or, they could just move to Europe, which is probably a more pragmatic idea.  Why be stuck in the north of Africa if you can be lounging  in the south of France?  This initiative alone will encourage massive immigration to the sleepy old nations of Europe who desperately need people to confer excess tax dollars to. 

Travel is only one dimension of course, think of all the spin-off benefits.  Luggage manufacturers, golf club makers, sunglasses makers and tour agencies would reap massive windfalls in new business.  Car rental agencies would experience growth in business not seen since the invention of no fault insurance.  Naturally, camera makers would get huge shots in the arm. 

The gaps in society will be greatly narrowed when the rich as well as the unemployed can share opinions on the quality of pastries at Maxim’s in Paris versus those available at Wittamar or Marcolini at the Place Sablon in Brussels.  How civilized would that be!  It will be hard to have class warfare and a fractionalized society if everyone can partake of the recent vintage Bordeaux at the au courant resorts.  They can all commiserate on the snippy service by the waiters, though I’m not sure who the waiters would complain about when they’re on vacation.   Good times are on the horizon for all.

link Timothy P. Carney: Goldman rallies for Obama in Wall Street ‘reform’ | Washington Examiner.

This will be interesting.  The general media will not understand that this is the story of the year, bigger than Tiger and yes, even bigger than Kate Gosselin on Dancing with the Stars. 

It appears that Goldman Sachs will be HELPING the administration with reforming Wall St practices!! They are coming out in favour of restrictions on capital use, of use of leverage and certain activities that would place banks in conflict with customers. 

!!! 

You can’t make this stuff up.  Goldman has long been the gold standard on the street, always making the most profit, being involved in the best deals and having the most connected top level people.  In fact the top finance people in the cabinets of many of the previous administrations look like an alumni roll call of ex Goldman people.  All the other banks on the street emulated Goldman’s business models, to the degree that they could and when Goldman created a profitable market space, the others were soon to follow. 

The big bonanza came when Goldman went public in the eighties which allowed not only much much larger pools of capital from which to lever their trading and investment positions, it also allowed the formerly careful partnership the ability to be less scrupulous about the degree of leverage employed in its banking activities.  A prudent person may leverage their postion say, 5 to 1 in order to achieve returns.  From accounts brought to light by books such as The Big Short, leverage was allowed to climb to 30 to 1 in some cases. 

Not to say that this is neccessarily imprudent, because that would be Monday morning quarterbacking, but it was the asymetric risk reward aspect discussed in earlier pieces that led to the  eventual damage to the financial system.  As of now, it’s only speculation as to whether this was imprudence borne of benign management ignorance or recklessness resulting from questionable practices.  In other words, they were either not smart enough, or TOO smart.

Either way, it appears illogical to engage them in searching for fixes. Why don’t they hire Bernie Madoff to advise them?  He’s about as expert as anyone and we know he’s not doing anything for the next 25 years.