1
U.S.
Dairy Finds a Way to Let Cows Power Trucks
An Indiana farm is turning the manure from its cows into fuel for its fleet of 42 delivery trucks, an endeavor that is being called a pacesetter for the dairy industry.
2
U.S.
Victim and Prosecutor Back Death Row Inmate’s Bid for Resentencing
Duane E. Buck’s guilt has never been disputed, but the testimony of a psychologist has raised questions about the role that race played in the decision to sentence him to die.
3
Science
Mystery Malady Kills More Bees, Heightening Worry on Farms
A mysterious ailment appears to have expanded drastically in the past year, wiping out as many as half of the hives needed to pollinate much of America’s produce.
4
Business Day
New Problem for Boeing 787 Battery Maker
GS Yuasa, the maker of the battery for the Boeing 787 that overheated and led to the grounding of the fleet, has discovered overheating in its lithium-ion battery for cars.
5
Technology
Tip of the Week: Beware of Tax Season Scams
E-mail messages that claim to be from the Internal Revenue Service asking for personal information are probably phishing scams.
6
Opinion
Benefits for Drug Felons
A political science professor at Emory responds to an editorial, “Unfair Punishments.”
7
Opinion
Down Syndrome and a Death
Why did an encounter between a man with Down syndrome and three off-duty county sheriff’s deputies at a movie theater have to turn deadly?
8
N.Y. / Region
U.S. Wants State to Pay After Audit of Youth Care
The Department of Health and Human Services criticized the operation of family-based rehabilitation homes for mentally ill and emotionally disturbed young people.
9
Business Day
The Most Common Consumer Complaints
The federal consumer agency said more than half the complaints it received concerned mortgages and a quarter were related to credit cards.
10
Real Estate
Tax-Abatement Changes Affect Many Unit Owners
Tax abatements for co-ops and condos will no longer be available to those who own their residences through trusts and LLCs.
11
Health
Link Is Found Between Stressful Events and Stillbirths
Pregnant women who have stressful experiences in the year before giving birth are more likely to deliver stillborn babies, a new study reports.
12
Business Day
Skepticism From Court in Drug Case
Several Supreme Court justices questioned the legality of some payments made by brand-name drug companies to potential generic competitors.
13
Opinion
The Ivy League Was Another Planet
If elite universities are looking for a more comprehensive tutorial in recruiting the talented rural poor, they might take a cue from one institution doing a truly stellar job: the military.
14
U.S.
New Mexico Farmers Seek ‘Priority Call’ as Drought Persists
With the Pecos River desiccated, some in southeastern New Mexico are trying to force the state to distribute water in a way that would allow most farmers to benefit over big industries.
15
Opinion
Antibiotics and the Meat We Eat
While the F.D.A. can see what kinds of antibiotic-resistant bacteria are coming out of livestock facilities, the agency knows little about the antibiotics that are being fed to the animals.
16
Business Day
Declining Wealth Brings a Rising Retirement Risk
With equity tied up in homes and facing the switch to defined-contribution pension plans, many Americans have been left short of funds needed for a comfortable retirement, an economist writes.
17
Multimedia
Photo That Was Hard to Get Published, but Even Harder to Get
An iconic World War II image nearly went unseen because the Pentagon wouldn’t allow photos to be published of American war dead. The image also was nearly never taken, because of the danger the photographer put himself in.
18
Business Day
Median Household Income Down 7.3% Since Start of Recession
For the first time in over a year, median annual income fell by a statistically significant amount from the previous month, according to a report from Sentier Research.
19
Opinion
Career and Family: The Choices We Face
Readers react to a longtime stay-at-home dad’s view of the work-family balance.
20
Business Day
Economy Grows Despite Tax Rise and Spending Cuts
Though weak, the expansion at the end of last year exceeded previous estimates and provided evidence that growth might have accelerated in early 2013.
Over the past few weeks, there has been a remarkable change of position
among the deficit scolds who have dominated economic policy debate for
more than three years. It’s as if someone sent out a memo saying that
the Chicken Little act, with its repeated warnings of a U.S. debt crisis
that keeps not happening, has outlived its usefulness. Suddenly, the
argument has changed: It’s not about the crisis next month; it’s about
the long run, about not cheating our children. The deficit, we’re told,
is really a moral issue.
There’s just one problem: The new argument is as bad as the old one.
Yes, we are cheating our children, but the deficit has nothing to do
with it.
Before I get there, a few words about the sudden switch in arguments.
There has, of course, been no explicit announcement of a change in
position. But the signs are everywhere. Pundits who spent years trying
to foster a sense of panic over the deficit have begun writing pieces
lamenting the likelihood that there won’t be a crisis,
after all. Maybe it wasn’t that significant when President Obama
declared that we don’t face any “immediate” debt crisis, but it did
represent a change in tone from his previous deficit-hawk rhetoric. And
it was startling, indeed, when John Boehner, the speaker of the House, said exactly the same thing a few days later.
What happened? Basically, the numbers refuse to cooperate: Interest
rates remain stubbornly low, deficits are declining and even 10-year
budget projections basically show a stable fiscal outlook rather than
exploding debt.
So talk of a fiscal crisis has subsided. Yet the deficit scolds haven’t
given up on their determination to bully the nation into slashing Social
Security and Medicare. So they have a new line: We must bring down the
deficit right away because it’s “generational warfare,” imposing a
crippling burden on the next generation.
What’s wrong with this argument? For one thing, it involves a
fundamental misunderstanding of what debt does to the economy.
Contrary to almost everything you read in the papers or see on TV, debt
doesn’t directly make our nation poorer; it’s essentially money we owe
to ourselves. Deficits would indirectly be making us poorer if they were
either leading to big trade deficits, increasing our overseas
borrowing, or crowding out investment, reducing future productive
capacity. But they aren’t: Trade deficits are down, not up, while business investment has actually recovered
fairly strongly from the slump. And the main reason businesses aren’t
investing more is inadequate demand. They’re sitting on lots of cash,
despite soaring profits, because there’s no reason to expand capacity
when you aren’t selling enough to use the capacity you have. In fact,
you can think of deficits mainly as a way to put some of that idle cash
to use.
Yet there is, as I said, a lot of truth to the charge that we’re
cheating our children. How? By neglecting public investment and failing
to provide jobs.
You don’t have to be a civil engineer to realize that America needs more and better infrastructure, but the latest “report card”
from the American Society of Civil Engineers — with its tally of
deficient dams, bridges, and more, and its overall grade of D+ — still
makes startling and depressing reading. And right now — with vast
numbers of unemployed construction workers and vast amounts of cash
sitting idle — would be a great time to rebuild our infrastructure. Yet
public investment has actually plunged since the slump began.
Or what about investing in our young? We’re cutting back there, too, having laid off hundreds of thousands of schoolteachers and slashed the aid that used to make college affordable for children of less-affluent families.
Last but not least, think of the waste of human potential caused by high
unemployment among younger Americans — for example, among recent
college graduates who can’t start their careers and will probably never make up the lost ground.
And why are we shortchanging the future so dramatically and inexcusably?
Blame the deficit scolds, who weep crocodile tears over the supposed
burden of debt on the next generation, but whose constant inveighing
against the risks of government borrowing, by undercutting political
support for public investment and job creation, has done far more to
cheat our children than deficits ever did.
Fiscal policy is, indeed, a moral issue, and we should be ashamed of
what we’re doing to the next generation’s economic prospects. But our
sin involves investing too little, not borrowing too much — and the
deficit scolds, for all their claims to have our children’s interests at
heart, are actually the bad guys in this story."
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