Entries Tagged 'Government' ↓

Could America have had hundreds of thousands more jobs by now than it does? You bet it could! Here’s an example of how one complex and obscure institution is being used by Congress to hold jobs for Americans hostage.

The US Export-Import Bank 

Ours is not the only Export-Import Bank in the world, but it is the most significant in terms of its financial impact on all parts of the globe. According to the Bank’s own web site, “Global Access for Small Business is a top priority of Ex-Im Bank”.

The Bank focuses on US small businesses who create goods for export abroad. The list of “Expenditures” on the map on ExIm’s home page bears this out. Most of the Bank’s assistance goes to our small businesses.

And the Bank is quite successful too! According to the Sacramento Bee this week [the link goes to updated report]:

In the past five years (from Fiscal Year 2008), Ex-Im Bank has earned for U.S. taxpayers nearly $1.6 billion above the cost of operations. The Bank provides a variety of financing mechanisms, including working capital guarantees, export-credit insurance and financing to help foreign buyers purchase U.S. goods and services.

Ex-Im Bank approved $32.7 billion in total authorizations in FY 2011 – an all-time Ex-Im record. This total includes more than $6 billion directly supporting small-business export sales – also an Ex-Im record. Ex-Im Bank’s total authorizations are supporting an estimated $41 billion in U.S. export sales and approximately 290,000 American jobs in communities across the country.

And there is more. On the ExIm.gov home page, the flashing banner reads “Ex-Im Bank Sets Record of $500 Million for Minority and Woman-Owned Business Support”.

So, why did the headline in the Financial Times for March 21, 2012 (p4) read “Export finance dispute divides Congress”? Continue reading →

For the Presidential debates, Mitt Romney promised to throw zingers at Obama. He did, but the zingers didn’t really stick. What stuck with viewers was the amazing performance by Mitt Romney at the October 3rd debate. Continue reading →

In Springsteen’s song, “Wrecking Ball,” the Giant’s Stadium at the Meadowlands in New Jersey muses on its life. The Stadium, a long-time spectator of the epic sports events taking place within it, now faces its own contest, one it knows to be its first and last, against a wrecking ball. True to its nature the Stadium is a warrior to the end.

At about the same age as Bruce is now, W.B. Yeats, Irish revolutionary poet, wrote about visiting a children’s school and asked his famous question, “How can we know the dancer from the dance?”

Likewise, at just a slightly older age than Yeats and Springsteen, I have to ask, “How can we know reforms from the reformers?” Continue reading →