Musings, Rants and Links over the 18th Fairway:03/16/2010

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Written by Lance | 16 March 2010

The French Finance Minister has noticed that the disparities within the European economy are causing a number of issues, and fingers the....Germans!

“Clearly Germany has done an awfully good job in the last 10 years or so, improving competitiveness, putting very high pressure on its labour costs. When you look at unit labour costs to Germany, they have done a tremendous job in that respect. I’m not sure it is a sustainable model for the long term and for the whole of the group. Clearly we need better convergence.”

You see, having an economy so efficient that you can be more competitive than your neighbors with high wages and a high standard of living means you need to change so that the French, Greeks and other assorted PIIGS can continue down the path they have chosen. The Germans are just too darned efficient for the greater good. In the interest of being helpful I have identified several important initiative's that the Germans should adopt to align themselves more fully with their neighbors.

  1. Do not keep your debt levels below 3% of GDP...ever.
  2. Encourage massive strikes at the drop of a hat.
  3. Make public services far more attractive than working in the private sector, with massive strikes and riots to keep it that way.
  4. Make it almost impossible to layoff anyone for any reason.
  5. Mandate at least six weeks paid vacation for every employee.

That should make sure your economy is not too efficient.

Is China's economy about to rollover?

I won't explain this, just let it sink in:

I don't think it will be as bad as Japan, but the evidence isn't giving me any great comfort either.

I love Apple, and I love my iPhone. Still, is Apple really worth more than Walmart? Or these various baskets:

  • 4x the global smartphone market
  • 5x the global music market
  • 100x the global smartphone app market
  • Enough to buy HP, Dell and Hitachi, with mad money left over for Xerox or Seagate

Yep, that whole efficient markets hypothesis may take a beating again.

Did any of you see Michael Lewis on 60 Minutes Sunday? If you didn't, I highly recommend it.

 

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