In order for the [CO2] emissions reductions to be reached that are required under the Act, energy prices have to go up. Gasoline, diesel fuel, electricity… otherwise it won’t change consumer behavior.
Here is what they haven't told us: The Education Department will borrow money at 2.8 percent from the Treasury, lend it to you at 6.8 percent and spend the difference on new programs. So you'll work longer to pay off your student loan to help pay for someone else's education -- and to help your U.S. representative's reelection.
The programs will cost billions of dollars with little if any derived benefit to the large users.
The furor over President Obama's trillion-dollar restructuring of American health care has left his other trillion-dollar plan starved for attention. That's how much the federal balance sheet will expand over the next decade if Mr. Obama can convince Congress to approve his pending takeover of the student-loan market.
I think that every single company that offers a credit card is reassessing its cost….reassessing what they do and how they do it.
This bill fundamentally changes the entire business model of credit cards by restricting the ability to price credit for risk. It is a fundamental rule of lending that an increase in risk means that less credit will be available and that the credit that is available will often have a higher interest rate.
The bill would, for instance, prohibit card companies from changing the rates they charge ‘at any time, for any reason.’ Translation: instead of a borrower’s interest rate varying up and down, it will just stay up. Or fees will rise, to offset issuers’ loss of pricing flexibility.
Dodd’s misbegotten bill would reduce competition and raise costs for the consumer—all so his office can generate press releases that say things like ‘Dodd Fights Card Companies.’ In fact, his fight will end up hurting his own constituents.
The President's plan, although touted as a means of promoting higher education, is not. The plan does not reduce the cost of student loans for a single student. Students and parents need to know that under this proposal, the government's profits on student loans borrowed by middle income students will be used to finance other student aid.
[The bill] raises taxes on a narrow sector of the U.S. economy with the aim of funding a broad-based entitlement program, which is grossly unfair and burdensome to American businesses and consumers.