By Spencer, Sorry, I have been tied up with other things and have not done my usual charts on the employment report. Others seem to be doing a pretty good job. But I would like to point out the issue that seems to be overlooked by everyone.That is the point that we are now starting […]

rdan 100 awesome blogs by some of the world’s smartest people from Online Univerities. I have to smile just before I go to the rat race this morning. MiscellaneousFrom these blogs, you’ll find expert information about the Air Force, UFOs and more. 98. UFO Hunters: The History Channel’s UFO hunters are experts in their niche […]

by cactus The End of the Recession – A Follow-Up In December, I wrote a post (which through a mixup went up in early January) about the end of the recession, stating this: Specifically, I expect it before the second half of next year. I’m actually hedging my bets here – my gut tells me […]

by Bruce Webb These figures show graphically what the recession has done to Social Security’s medium term outlook. Answer? Not much.. A near term dip in income is never fully recovered in dollar terms. A DI ‘Primary Surplus’ heading for zero got there a little faster. Does any of this add up to rushing to […]

rdan Texas Observer carries commentary that is revealing. Editor’s note: These remarks were delivered to a meeting of the Texas Lyceum in Austin on April 3, at a debate between University of Texas professor James Galbraith, an Observer contributing writer, and former Majority Leader Richard Armey, chief instigator of the recent Astroturf “tea party” protests. […]

By divorced one like Bush The following from Robert’s post got me thinking about railroads. “There have been three big banking booms in modern U.S. history. The first began in the late nineteenth century, during the Second Industrial Revolution, when bankers like J. P. Morgan funded the creation of industrial giants like U.S. Steel and […]

Robert Waldmann James Surowiecki has an interesting article on this topic in the May 11 New Yorker. He reaches rather precise conclusions including “The desire to bring back the boring, small banking industry of the nineteen-fifties is understandable. Unfortunately, the only way to do that would be to bring back the economy of the fifties, […]

by cactus The Greenspan Fed, the 2000 Election, and the 2001 Recession In the past, I’ve had a few posts on the Greenspan era Fed. I’ve noted that some of its behavior seemed somewhat, er, biased, almost as if it the money supply was contracted a bit too much around election time when Democrats held […]

by David Zetland, post from Aguanomics Right to Water01 May 2009 I frequently say that was should be allocated on a “some for free, pay for more basis.” I borrowed this idea from South Africa, where water as a human right has been written into the constitution. Here’s an update [in french] on the right […]

rdan PEW Research Center has a small (724) sample of opinions among US citizens on the use of torture to gain important information. I believe it is too small to generate reliable data on differences among cohorts, class, and religiosity, but can be useful for discussions if the split is about 50/50.