by Bruce Webb I’ll let the other Bears comment on this one. I just thought the graphic useful. As always click to enlarge. For table plus footnotes click the link.Major Foreign Holders of U.S. Treasuries

January industrial production rose 0.9%, with the gains with gains across almost all components. Industrial production has now risen for seven months and is 5.5% above its bottom. This implies that so far industrial production has been rising at a 9.4% annual rate. Compared to previous industrial production recoveries this appears to be about a […]

by Brenda Rossercrossposted with Econospeak The currency quarrel with China is a dangerous distraction In an article in the Washington Post last November entitled ‘The currency quarrel’ [1] there were a number of assertions made about the economic relationship between the US and China that are questionable, to say the least. The opening sentence begins […]

by Daniel J. Becker Back in June of ’08 I asked regarding Jason Furman’s appointment by Obama: Is this the concession the Clinton/Blue Dog group was looking for? The DLC still keeps control of the money issues? I asked because of his connection to the Hamilton Project at the Brookings Institute: Hamilton Project, a small […]

“The argument that the two parties should represent opposed ideals and policies, one, perhaps, of the Right and the other of the Left, is a foolish idea acceptable only to doctrinaire and academic thinkers. Instead, the two parties should be almost identical, so that the American people can throw the rascals out at any election […]

by Bruce Webb (UPDATE: Digby readers, I want to make it clear that I am not NewDealDemocrat, I just got permission to cross-post this important compilation from NDD.) Blog friend NewDealDemocrat has a recommended diary up on dKos called Mr. President, No Real Democrat is agnostic about Social Security. NewDeal gave me an advance look […]

I was going to post something a couple of days ago on Greece’s derivatives deal, but knew I was missing a key piece. It became prominent yesterday, and Felix’s summary today gets it spot on: So while it’s entirely fair to blame Greece for trying to hide its debt, and to blame Eurostat for letting […]

Tom aka Rusty Rustbelt The Independent Contractor Problem Continues and Grows HT: Associated Press The IRS and many state governments are stepping up enforcement of the use of “independent contractors” who are actually employees. While there are plenty of legitimate business-to-business independent contractor arrangements, other businesses sidestep the law by misclassifying employees as ICs. (lay […]

What is a good approximation ?The word good is important but very general. One (long long ago) I pulled a hair out of my scalp and told Elisabetta Addis (we’re married) “look my first white hair.” She replied “you have a very good wife and a very bad mirror.” Odd the same event, failure to […]