Even if empirical studies show that extending benefits reduces slightly the incentive to seek employment, that argument is weaker (and crueler), he writes, as the ratio of job seekers to job openings rises to very high levels, as it is now.

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"Common sense suggests that a one-to-one ratio is woefully inadequate, " Rashkin writes in his book.

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At a leverage ratio of 71:1, Grant writes, the New York Fed should be the first to be lining up executors and filing an end-of-life plan.

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Grose writes that if US child care providers increased that ratio, they could pay their day care workers more.

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