SAR #8150

You are not supposed to value assets
based on what they might be worth
on Aunt Dibbie's 74th birthday.

Merry Go Round: Dow Chemical, the largest U.S. chemical maker, is raising prices 20% on June 1st, to recoup their 42% increase in costs for energy and raw materials. The company called the increase "unparalleled", but it won't be very long.

Retired: Indonesia will withdraw from the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries because it is no longer a petroleum exporting country.

Vacation Plans: UBS has told its employees who 'helped' rich US clients not to travel to the US. It has also made lawyers available to more than 50 of the UBS staff who may be persons of interest to US DOJ and SEC investigators. They've also asked these individuals to turn in their whistles.

Don't Say "Peaked": Russia's government has proposed urgent measures to halt a slide in oil production. As the world's top oil consumer, the US wishes them well. Or wells.

Magic Elixir: A WSJ article - by an economist and a businessman - explains that what the US needs to do to improve its abysmal healthcare system is to cut costs by "the importation of doctors." This would be cheaper than crating up the patients and shipping them overseas.

The River is Wide: Former Fed NY economist Richard Alford complains that US economic policy is based on the idea that the US exists independent of the rest of the world. The rest of the world wishes this were true.

Way-Back Machine: Sit comfortably, close your eyes, and meditate on the following: House prices have fallen 14% in the last year and is approaching a 27% fall in 2008. Inventory is at a record high, sales of new houses are down 42%. Prices are still 60% above 2000.

Obvious Solution: With Bush intent on making it difficult for laborers to get to their jobs, American farms are moving the jobs to the workers. It's no longer just industry that is fleeing the country.

Haves, Have Mores: According to the IRS, in 2006, 2,833 filers with incomes over $200,000 paid no tax. A year later that number had more than doubled to 7,389 returns paying no tax on incomes over $200,000. And they feel good about this; smug, even.

Summer Reading: "The Predator State: How Conservatives Abandoned the Free Market and Why Liberals Should Too" Jaimie Gailbraith. The title sold me.

Green Card: In the fight to lower carbon emissions, British MPs advocate issuing every adult a carbon-unit ration card to be presented whenever paying for petrol, airline tickets, electricity and gas. The Government says it supports the scheme in principle, but warns it is ‘ahead of its time’, preferring to wait until it is too late.

Porn O'Graph: Housing's spring, the smelly season.