Rani

[Rani @lbnotes]

@hahussain The price elasticity of oil can also explain these numbers.

[Rani @lbnotes]

Is a voice call going through VPN considered indirect?

[This Is Beirut @ThisIsBeirut_]

🗣️ Speaker of the Lebanese Parliament Nabih Berri:

We are not against negotiating with Israel, provided that it is ‘indirect’.

We renew the call for the displaced to wait and not return to South Lebanon currently.

[Rani @lbnotes]

@GermanosPeter You’re assuming that distinguishing between the two is always easy.

[Rani @lbnotes]

@ikreidieh I think the idea is that a global, blanket criminalization of any and all civilian-to-civilian contact regardless of context or intent is a human rights issue more than anything else. Millions of people are automatically criminalized.

[Rani @lbnotes]

@Confusezeus @JamilMouawad Operation Deja Vu

[Rani @lbnotes]

“… we won’t allow justified cost increases abroad to translate into unjustified price increases inside the country…”

I give this quote a grade of F for economic knowledge but A+ for poetic value 👍

[Rani @lbnotes]

Lebanese midwits: “Civil war is impossible because there’s only one armed militia.”

Me: “But this means they win without fighting, which is even worse!”

[Rani @lbnotes]

I’m hearing many Lebanese pundits refer to a supreme being called “Chapter 7” that would come down from heaven and solve all the country’s problems.

So I decided to go do some research to find out what they’re talking about.

[Rani @lbnotes]

@Hraoui17 Well i think the top priority of any bank is to preserve the deposits, and the best way to do that is to separate the deposit and investment functions. Mixing the two functions is inherently unstable. I once wrote a thread on that👇

[Rani @lbnotes]

5/ …should all be there according to the original legal principles of safekeeping, but modern banking has distorted these principles and gave birth to the monstrosity that we today call fractional reserve banking (FRB). This is explained in this book by Jesús Huerta de Soto.

[Rani @lbnotes]

@Hraoui17 Yes just a regulatory body to make sure all banks keep 100% reserves. Since bank runs are impossible in such banks, there is no need for a central bank to provide liquidity in times of crisis.

[Rani @lbnotes]

In my opinion, the solution to the banking sector is to switch from fractional reserve banking to 100% reserve banking. To do that we need to liquidate all the banks plus BDL and start from scratch. Lebanese citizen depositors (and _only_ citizens) will be paid with the banks’ assets and BDL assets (the gold). The new banks with have 100% reserves, so a central bank will not be needed.

[Rani @lbnotes]

@JoeIssaElKhoury He is advocating for protectionism, which benefits the few while impoverishing everyone else. Prosperity comes from free trade and a market economy, not protectionism and government restrictions.

[Rani @lbnotes]

When you have a minister of economy who is clueless about how prices work, tax increases are the least of your problems.

[Rani @lbnotes]

@Jessica_Obeid Well bc political power is zero-sum. Giving up your share simply increases the share of your opponents.

[Rani @lbnotes]

@AlbertKostanian Actually, progressive taxation is even worse. We need to cut spending and cut taxes.

[Rani @lbnotes]

The government is more responsible for the safety of things that it built than of things it didn’t build.
Public funds should go toward fixing public roads, not private buildings.

[Rani @lbnotes]

A deputy in the Lebanese parliament: “Hasn’t the time come for the army to have factories and independent income streams as is the case for the Egyptian army for example?”

Me: [looks at watch]… “No as a matter of fact, the time has not yet come for this level of insanity yet.”

[Rani @lbnotes]

@AzarsTweets But is "debt sustainability" in Lebanon's interest? It seems everyone has blindly assumed that the cost/benefit ratio of repudiating Lebanon's huge foreign debt is greater than 1. But in truth, repudiation is a serious and sensible option that should be studied.

[Rani @lbnotes]

@riachi_jean Sorry but this analysis is flawed, because no money is "injected". The money is NOT an external gift but comes from taxpayers. So your analysis shouldv SUBTRACTED the damage caused by taking money from people's pockets from the benefit (which you described) of putting it back in