Friday ruminations

• In my Speakers Corner tonight at school, we talked about the Economic Crisis. Most students said the U.S. government should bail out the Big Three Automakers. One student and I dissented. The students in support used the standard argument about all the jobs would be lost. Another argument employed was that the Automakers make good products that all want to buy but were victims like everybody else of the greedy financiers. But thinking about it, I say that it only shows how out of whack the financing was and as a result so were most of the economic decisions made by the Automakers. As well, I say that everyone would love to have a Ferrari or a big house too but that is just not economically possible. And if the providers of these goods tried to sell them at too high a price or tried to give insane financial support in order to get a sale, they would justifiably go bankrupt. Another student suggested that the government should try to stimulate the economy because many people with money in their pockets are scared to spend their money. I tried to point out that many people don't have money in their pockets as the level of consumer debt in America should show. And this trying to circulate money in the economy to stimulate it is a Keynesian notion that should have been discredited in the 1970s. The students also said that the Chinese economy would not be so effected by the crisis because of their government employing macroeconomic management techniques with Chinese characteristics. Hmmm.....
• The wife was vomiting tonight. She said she ate so much. I hope that is the reason. But it is a worry. As I type, she sleeps, as does my son.
• I also learned in the Speakers Corner that most Wuxinese have not put on the heat in their apartments. They will wait till it gets severely cold before they do. For now, they will wear more and more layers of clothes. That is what I am doing now.
• I had a Wuxi T.V. reporter in a class today. I will have to watch some television now.
• Tomorrow, I will do the movie Airplane in my movie salon. I will have the students to recount the gags, both word and visual, they heard and saw.
• A day in the life of my school.