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

SLAPP Happy Dog-Shooter

From Howard Bashman’s How Appealing blog today: Florida’s Fifth District Court of Appeal yesterday issued a ruling in a case described as “SLAPP Happy Dog-Shooter“: The “Siouxsie Law” blog had this post about the case back in March 2010. And in July 2011, “Siouxsie Law” had a related post titled “Court rules in favor of […]

What’s happening with the Phillips curve ?

Paul Krugman notes that it is standard practice to estimate an accelerationist Phillips curve in which the change in inflation is related to unemployment. He also notes that recent data seem to form the original Phillips curve, that is the scatter of inflation on unemployment forms a curve. He asked if someone might have rolling […]

Polk County Arkansas 9th Street Ministries Medical Mission Clinic is Closing

After providing free medical services to individuals without Medicare, Medicaid, or commercial insurance since 1998, Polk County, Arkansas’ 9th Street Ministries medical clinic mission will be closing its doors on April 24, 2014. Although the clinic faced funding difficulties during the Great Recession, the reason for its closure is unrelated to finances or lack of […]

Christina Romer & Not fearing an economic correction of mistakes

A talk given by Christina Romer was very good. (Posted by Mark Thoma) She said many practical things about economic downturns. She loved to refer back to the Great Depression. The basic message was not to fear downturns, and to be careful of doing anything to prolong them. Economies will recover normally and fairly quickly […]

Key variable in model for Secular Stagnation is Labor Share

The search for a model to explain Secular Stagnation is happening behind the scenes at the moment. Larry Summers is presenting Secular Stagnation as an Inverse of Say’s Law… “Lack of demand over time creates lack of supply”. But getting the mathematical mechanisms of how lack of demand suppresses supply (output) seems to be missing. […]

How Many of Obamacare’s New Enrollees Were Uninsured Last Year? Why It Doesn’t Matter

Maggie Mahar on the Uninsured: As I explain in an earlier post, Charles Gaba, the enrollment guru who has been tracking Obamacare sign-ups since October, now estimates that by April 15, some 17 million Americans will have purchased their own insurance policies either in the Obamacare Exchanges (8 million) or off-Exchange (9 million) But how […]

John Roberts Introduces a New Favorite Tactic This Term: Sleights-of-Hand Analogies

Roberts suggested that he believes Hobby Lobby and Conestoga Wood can bring forth claims of religious freedom, saying courts have held that “corporations can bring racial discrimination claims as corporations” and that “those cases involve construction of the term ‘person.’” – John Roberts Offers Conservatives A Way Out Of Birth Control Dilemma, Sahil Kapur, TPM, […]