Wednesday, April 16, 2008

Cartoon for April 17

How low can the Fed go?

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11 comments:

  1. ben bernanckeApril 16, 2008 at 5:55 PM

    Now there's a comic that would fetch more than $102.50 at auction!

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  2. Aggie DudeApril 17, 2008 at 8:50 AM

    How far will they go? The Bush administration started with a $300 tax credit, and ended with one as well!!

    Bernanke is not spelled with a ck, dude...

    TED!!!! I think you should test your theory by PAYING me to take your artwork....

    I also think your comment in the piece that says "you can't pay people to make money" should not be undervalued...after all, that's what corporate economics are all about...getting people underneath you to produce and then claiming a percentage of that production as your own, thus justifying a higher salary.

    If we focused technological innovation on the individual, rather than focusing on what can make corporate profits skyrocket, the economic structure would change.

    This isn't about "making the pie higher" as our fearless leader suggests, it's about actually making it a pie, instead of an upside-down pineapple cake.

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  3. Kurt OApril 17, 2008 at 9:09 AM

    This one is hysterical. The last panel may have an element of truth to it. People tend to not value that which is free. I work with several bands and I tell them all that when they play a show they should have some guarantee to get paid and that they should never give away CDs. CDs for free are worthless coasters, but if you pay a dollar, chances are you will at least listen to the first 2 tracks.

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  4. AnonymousApril 17, 2008 at 9:56 AM

    Before we all laugh, I would like to remind every body that if you adjust for inflation (or in this case deflation) a negative interest rate is very much a realisitc possibility.

    Cheers !

    Y_S

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  5. Anonymous PrimeApril 17, 2008 at 11:33 AM

    I've had a similar idea floating in my head for a while-- that the economy would get so bad that currency itself achieved negative value. Economic Inversion. Having money on you now meant you *owed* somebody, so there'd be poor (formerly wealthy) people pushing around grocery carts jammed with cash they couldn't ever unload, and the richest people in the nation were the ones who were broke. Something like that.

    Given our credit-card-based buying habits at the moment, we're halfway there.

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  6. I meant bernankeApril 17, 2008 at 7:35 PM

    Well you misspelled "douchebag" way worse.

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  7. davidApril 17, 2008 at 8:44 PM

    That guy in the first and fourth panels looks suspiciously like the Halliburton from one comic ago.

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  8. AnonymousApril 18, 2008 at 12:37 AM

    "I've had a similar idea floating in my head for a while-- that the economy would get so bad that currency itself achieved negative value. Economic Inversion. Having money on you now meant you *owed* somebody, so there'd be poor (formerly wealthy) people pushing around grocery carts jammed with cash they couldn't ever unload, and the richest people in the nation were the ones who were broke. Something like that."

    Actually economists modelled "negative-intrest currency" in the 1970s and found that it actually could work, but you would have to spend the money as fast as you got it. I forsee Latin American-style currency revisions (i.e. one-dallar bills stamped "5 dollars" and such) in our near future. Welcome to Brazil in the late 1970s.

    - Strelnikov

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  9. AnonymousApril 18, 2008 at 7:26 AM

    didn't ted do one like this a while back? a few years ago, at least - the last time the Fed was dropping rates through the floor...

    for a panel or two, i thought he was doing a "Flashback" 'toon, like Tom Toles sometimes does to show how cyclical things are, or how prophetic he can be....

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  10. GreenguyApril 19, 2008 at 1:27 PM

    Keynes actually discussed having something like a currency that depreciated over time, forcing people to spend it or have it lose value. Difficult to pull off in reality, however.

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  11. AnonymousApril 20, 2008 at 8:05 PM

    Since inflation is running about 3-4% depending on which measurement you look at, and nominal short-term rates are from 0.75% to 2.25%, we are actually in a negative interest rate environment.

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