John Mauldin's Outside the Box

The U.S. withdrawal date has come and gone. What will post-withdrawal Iraq look like? Can the Iraqi security forces fill the void? How will Iran exploit the diminished U.S. presence? To understand the answers to these questions you need a perspective the is to the point and contains no bias. In today's Outside the Box I'm including a insightful video from the analysts at STRATFOR, a global intelligence company.

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This weekend I wrote about the problems of being an entrepreneur in our Muddle Through Economy. I would like to follow that up with two brief (but somewhat controversial) essays on two aspects of starting up small businesses. The first, by Vivek Wadhwa, points out that start-ups account for all of the net new jobs, and is a summary of a paper from the Kaufman Foundation. (You can read the 12 page paper at http://www.kauffman.org/uploadedFiles/firm_formation_importance_of_startups.pdf)

The second is by my friend William C. Dunkelberg, the Chief Economist of the National Federation of Independent Business. He asks a very simple question: Why is thrift getting such a bad name? And if we take the potential savings from “the rich,” where will the savings come from to invest in start-ups?

Vivek Wadhwa is an entrepreneur turned academic. He is a Visiting Scholar at the School of Information at UC-Berkeley, Senior Research Associate at Harvard Law School and Director of Research at the Center for Entrepreneurship and Research Commercialization at Duke University.

The both make for thought-provoking reading, and offer some challenges to the conventional wisdom, which is what Outside the Box is supposed to do.

Your doing his part by creating start-ups analyst,

John Mauldin, Editor Outside the Box

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There were a lot of questions last week when I wrote about public pensions. So for this week’s Outside the Box, I offer you some more information about how bad the state deficit situation is, and for your specific state. States are having to cut more than 1% of national GDP in fiscal 2011, as federal stimulus money is slowly drying up. And that is just states. Local municipalities and schools have a similar problem. And then add on the possibility of the Bush tax cuts going away and that is a very serious situation. It is why I am so concerned and vocal about the need for the Bush tax cuts to be extended for at least one year until the economy is growing above stall speed. The headwinds from cities and states are severe, as you can see.

Basically, the states were profligate going into the downturn, and they have enormous costs going forward, so even for 2011 and 2012 they are going to have massive budget deficits. Some, like Illinois and Nevada have shortfalls of 40-50%. That is simply not sustainable.

The research is from the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities at http://www.cbpp.org/cms/index.cfm?fa=view&id=711 . for those in the US, I think you will find it interesting to see how your state is doing. For those outside, look and see how much the problem is in terms of GDP and realize what impact that is going to have on the overall US economy.

I am at the airport in Omaha with Trey on a trip looking at schools, and on to Illinois tonight. It is a lot cooler here than in Dallas, at least.

Your data watching analyst,

John Mauldin, Editor Outside the Box

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The immigration issue and Arizona’s controversial new law provokes passions on all sides.  But too often the debate doesn’t reflect the complex history and geopolitics that inform the issue

Today I'm sending you an article from George Friedman, expert on geopolitics & founder of STRATFOR.  Dr. Friedman presents his unique perspective on the immigration issue by touching on everything from the geography of the borderlands to Andrew Jackson and the importance of New Orleans. It is a prime example of how putting an issue like immigration in a geopolitical perspective gives you context for understanding how events are related and what the future may hold.

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Before we get into today's Outside the Box I want to clear up a few ideas from this weekend's letter. There have been posts on various websites equating my piece on deflation with Paul Krugman. They say I am advocating kicking the can down the road and not reducing the deficit.

Wrong. What I have been trying to point out for several years is that we have no good choices. We are down to bad and very bad choices. The very bad choice (leading to disastrous - think Greece) is to continue to run massive deficits. The merely bad choice is to reduce the deficits gradually over time. As I try to point out, reducing the deficits has consequences in the short term. It WILL affect GDP in the short term. Krugman and the neo-Keynesians are right about that. To deny that is to ignore basic arithmetic.

I am not for kicking the can down the road. Not to begin to deal with the deficits, and soon, risks an even worse problem. But - and this is a big but - I don't want to stomp on the can, either.

Now, let's get into this week's Outside the Box. I offer you a very intriguing essay by those friendly guys from Bedlam Asset Management in London. They argue that Belgium's sovereign debt should be suspect, and is the country that could be a 'sleeper' problem. This is a very interesting read, with a lot of history. It is not too long and very interesting. Enjoy....

This week we turn our eyes to Asia as my friend Louis Gave of GaveKal gives us a very thought-provoking piece on the problems of investing in Asia, with a focus on China. While there are real opportunities, Louis also sees some speed bumps. Those Asian ETFs may not be the winners a lot of people think for structural reasons.

I was to thank the team at GaveKal for letting me reproduce their research as typically it is only available to their clients who pay a rather hefty sum.

This has been a productive weekend book writing wise. I am down to finishing 2 chapters which are mostly written and two long flights to Vancouver in front of me. Then the hard part of re-writes but I can see the end of the race. Have a great week, and if you are in Vancouver be sure to say hello.

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In the last six months, the eurozone has faced its biggest economic challenge to date - one sparked by the Greek debt crisis which has migrated to the rest of the monetary union. But well before the sovereign debt crisis, Europe was facing a full-blown banking crisis that did not seem any closer to being resolved than when it began in late 2008. With investors and markets focused on European governments' debt problems, the banking issues have largely been ignored. However, the sovereign debt crisis and banking crisis have become intertwined and could feed off each other in the near future.

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While the U.S. was celebrating its World Cup victory over Algeria, another struggle was playing out in Washington that also grabbed the world's attention. In that instance, the loser was Gen. Stanley McChrystal, who was forced by the president to resign his command of U.S. forces in Afghanistan.

Since STRATFOR is more of an expert on geopolitics than the World Cup, I'm including an article from them on the current Gen. McChrystal shake-up. It's an example of the kind of behind-the-scenes intelligence reporting that makes them famous.

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