President Barack Obama and his administration have cited numerous job statistics after last week’s successful initial public offering of General Motors. John Berlau, director of the Competitive Enterprise Institute’s Center for Investors and Entrepreneurs investigated the numbers, and argues that the figures cited to support the bailout of Chrysler and GM are extremely misleading.

As we write, President Obama and Vice President Biden are doing a victory lap around a Chrysler plant in Kokomo, Indiana, in the wake of the recent successful initial public offering of General Motors. read more »

President Obama’s twin goals of more bank loans and more heavy-handed regulation are in conflict with each other. Large financial institutions, such as the ones represented at the White House, as well as smaller regional banks and credit unions, may be holding back their lending due to uncertainty — both about the economy and about what Washington is going to do. read more »

President Obama’s announcement that he will extend TARP — the Troubled Assets Relief Program — and keep spending its proceeds could not have come at a worse time. Credit rating agencies are looking at dropping the “Triple A” rating from the U.S. because of the trillions in spending on bailouts, stimulus and other big-government programs. The rationale put forward seems to be that because we spent this for undeserving big banks, it’s only fair to spend the rest of taxpayer dollars on small businesses, but two wrongs don’t make a right, and this money belongs to taxpayers, not to the favored recipients of politicians. Whether TARP funds go to small or big businesses read more »