Relevant and even prescient commentary on news, politics and the economy.

The Bank of Japan and Breakevens

Scott Sumner (via Matt Yglesias) has a very impressive graph of breakeven inflation rates for yen denominated vs inflation protected securities in Japan (which seems to have something to do with Fathom Consulting just to cite).  It shows a marked increase from around 0% to around 0,8% from early February 2011 to  late April 2011. […]

Posts and comments

I dearly love comment sections on certain websites. Some are entertaining, and some are guaranteed to lead to links for further thought. Others are stocked with slogans and utterances of magical thought without caveat. However, what can be missed are those posts which do not draw much comment…it needs to be mentioned that these posts […]

Pete Peterson…success or failure?

Dean Baker on occasion mentions the influence of Pete Peterson, and Peterson funded the Simpson Bowles efforts, and this piece by Thom Hartmann takes a current look: While a name well known to some, it is interesting I rarely hear it mentioned in less political circles. I run into the Soros name more often… But […]

Derivatives, water and financial risk

David Zetland comments on future funding of ‘water’ risk management.  There are plenty of examples of misguided government interventions, as well as examples of private enterprise run amok.  Now a derivatives market? : The danger of flashing wrong signals Have you heard the stories of people who have driven through fields, into lakes or off […]

The Tragedy of Detroit

by Tom aka Rusty Rustbelt The Tragedy of DetroitOne of the great highlights of my life was my first visit to Detroit in 1962. I fell in love with the metropolis and of course the Detroit Tigers. This week the governor of Michigan will appoint an emergency financial manager for Detroit, if anyone will take […]

Politicians think their constituents are more conservative than they are

Dylan Matthews reports fascinating research which contrasts state legislators’ estimates of their constituents views on some key issues with polling data on those views.  David Broockman and Christopher Skovron find that liberal politicians overestimate their constituents conservativeness and conservative politicians vastly overestimate their constituents conservativeness.  The post is too good do summarize so just click […]

From Today’s New York Times Front Page, and From Tomorrow’s New York Times Op-Ed Page

Today, in the New York Times: With the Dow Jones industrial average flirting with a record high, the split between American workers and the companies that employ them is widening and could worsen in the next few months as federal budget cuts take hold. … “So far in this recovery, corporations have captured an unusually […]