The 2012 AEA Program lists all of the paper presentation sessions that will take place in Chicago in early 2012.  It provides a clear sense of our research agenda.  Is any of this work policy relevant?  Yes!  To offer just one example, read this paper  by Paul Joskow and Catherine Wolfram on electricity pricing and the rise of the smart grid.
I am off to Berkeley and wish everyone a happy holidays and New Year!
And good wishes to you.
The Joskow/Wolfram paper is a decent, readable and non-technical update, and I encourage readers to have a look at it.
I take the opportunity of advertising my libertarian (!) argument of three Christmases ago that good smart meters anf domotic home managers are so intrusive that they should be owned by householders, not utilities, or at a pinch by trusted third parties.
I propose a 100% corporate income tax ***
a change of subject, because I’m just a regular guy and this may be my biggest arena:
If low taxes created jobs, we’d be awash in jobs. More jobs than people, but No! Look around at our economy; there are plenty of toasters of every kind in stores; what’s missing is not another foreign toaster factory, but someone with a job able to buy said toaster.
Republicans always talk about the “job creatorsâ€. Well, how about them job creators? American corporations are making more money than they ever had, and are paying their CEOs a huge amount – beyond reason. Yes, beyond reason. Does $150 Million in one year sound like a fair earned amount?
Corporations are sitting on over $2Trillion dollars, and not doing anything constructive with all that cash. Stock buy-backs don’t make jobs or GDP growth; same with cash hoarding. The country is sinking, over half of it going broke while the corporations and the upper 5% have never had it so good.
To push corporations into being better citizens, and more involved, I propose a 100% corporate income tax. First, what is a corporation for? It’s an investment vehicle and a mechanism for delivering product/service ideally with a profit. The corporations operate unimpeded; deducting all costs including business taxes, expenses, and employee pay and ancillary costs. They can pay their CEO anything they want, and pay any dividend they want. Then allow a 5 year tax-free revolving unlimited cash ‘slush†fund that hopefully would be used for growth/infrastructure/investment. Whatever is left is taxed 100%.
This pushes cash out into our economy. Money spread out by expense, pay, dividends, and taxes are the power that our economy needs. Give the businesses a 5 year strategic reservoir, then push the rest out into our economy. If they hate taxes, the companies could either pay out more in wages and/or dividends, or lower prices.