donzelion

The Post Office, FedEx and UPS Model for Health Insurance

Let's expand the basic logic Steinberg offers.

Police are the primary line of anti-criminal protection: is it possible for private security guards to "compete," even though their hands are relatively tied (can't arrest or shoot people)?

State/federal/municipal sources are the primary source for road construction in America. Can private toll road operators compete?

Every state offers its own higher education system in America, most funded in part by taxpayers. Can private universities compete? (Can they do that at the K-12 level? Quite often - and even without vouchers).

A government competitor entering the field threatens to catch the low-hanging fruit (high volume, low value stuff), which will squeeze margins for many existing players. Yet with 50+ million Americans uninsured, it's not like they're taking customers away, is it? Steinberg's (and Obama's) point that private industry can compete and defeat government in numerous niches is sound, and readily demonstrated in many other contexts.

Despite Massive Layoffs Nationwide, These 28 Companies Are Hiring

For many major corporations, the pattern has been

(1) lay off personnel, then rehire some in a different position, or as a consultant (reducing long-term pension liabilities, changing vesting rights, and lowering health care liabilities)
(2) lay off personnel from one division, but give others the right to get first dibs on jobs in another division
(3) lay off personnel in union shops and relocate operations in "right-to-work" jurisdictions

Getting a clear picture of employment plans is about as straightforward as analyzing financials from banks with extremely complex financial products. An investor must be extremely cautious about drawing conclusions from any such hiring.

Markets Close Up, Not Sure Why

Citibank went from losses of $5 billion to earnings of $2 billion, a positive surge of $7 billion or so over the previous period. How could it happen?

Possibility 1: Citibank's job cuts amounted to massive savings.
Possibility 2: the recession and downturn are a lie manufactured by evil media that want to lead everyone astray.
Possibility 3: great leadership has saved the day.
Possibility 4: modified accounting rules have removed losses from the equation, leaving only games.

Somehow, I find all but the fourth possibility to be laughable. However, maybe somebody can come up with a better alternative...

Companies Facing Pension Deficits and EPS Impact

The conspiracy of silence regarding pensions is amazing.

Although social security is orders of magnitude more secure than the majority of the pensions or 401k structures out there, legions of Americans have been told that the collapse of social security was imminent (while the public/private pension schemes have actually started to collapse).

I suspect the reasons involve the fact that so many in the financial services industry make so much money managing pensions without adding any real value. Like parasites, they drain the pensions before a pensioner ever receives a dime...then they blame others when the pension falls short, and beg for a bail out.