One of the main provisions of the 2012 Farm Bill is a “shallow-loss” program. This program is being portrayed as a safety net, but there are significant questions that must be examined before the program is enacted. At this event, Vince Smith and Barry Goodwin will discuss these questions and will release new research and analysis on the cost of shallow-loss programs.

It’s depressing to watch, but it is missing the point that the Volcker rule would not have prevented the loss and is probably unworkable.

The banking industry suffered credit crises in the 1970s, 1980s, 1990s, and 2000s. An unavoidable conclusion is that its loan loss reserves were in all cases too small. 

From the perspective of the corporate profit and loss statement, a trading loss is one expense item in the context of all revenues and expenses. So $2 billion should be compared to the bank's $26.7 billion in pretax profits for 2011, suggesting a reduction of something less than 10 percent in annual profit.

A poignant story in Thursday’s Boston Globe describes how the O’Donnell family of Boston channeled their love of a son, Joey, who died tragically at the age of 12 from cystic fibrosis, into a successful mission to develop impactful new treatments for this terrible affliction.

The $2 billion loss by JPMorgan Chase has reawakened debate about whether banks are taking excessive risks, but many facts have gotten lost in the breathless media coverage.

AEI's J.D. Kleinke examines the magnitude, symbolism, and likely impacts of the accounting rule included in the Accountable Care Act to regulate the administrative costs and profits of the health insurance industry.

The shallow-loss program would give farmers subsidies to bring them up to 90 percent or even 95 percent of the average revenues they have received for any given crop over the previous five years whenever current revenues from those crops fall below those amounts. Anyone who knows anything about American agriculture understands just how implausible that idea is.