Trade was a significant factor in the weak GDP report today and as usual when this happens you see many comments that do not understand why imports are a negative in calculating GDP. We do not directly calculate GDP. Rather, we calculate consumption and adjust that for trade and inventories to obtain GDP indirectly. To […]
Parsing the Poland Problem Paradox: Local Versus National Outcomes As argued in numerous posts here, we have seen an apparently emerging disconnect between economic conditions and political outcomes in a variety of nations, with anti-immigrant or more generally nationalist or populist parties with authoritarian tendencies gaining strength in many nations despite apparently improving or even […]
A note on December existing home sales First of all, sorry for the light posting this week. There’s not much news until tomorrow and Friday, and yesterday was a travel day. So….. While existing home sales are about 90% of the entire housing market, they are the least important economically, because of their much more […]
Is Trump’s Washing Machine Tariff To Punish South Korea For Being Too Friendly With North Korea? I have seen nobody claim this, and this may simply be a matter of collateral damage, as Trump has officially approved of the recent openings related to the forthcoming Winter Olympics in South Korea, especially since South Korean President […]
Recent increased interest rates probably won’t derail housing In the last couple of weeks, long term interest rates have moved significantly higher. As of yesterday, the 10 year bond closed at roughly 2.66%, its highest yield in 3 1/2 years. If this move is sustained for a few months, I expect it to have an […]
McConnell is a weasel. He has sold out his own by making promises and then reneging on them like he did with Collins. He makes promises to Democrats and then reverses his stance laying the blame on them. Over at Washington Monthly, the writers think Schumer needs to up his game. Lets ask the question […]
Amazon scores two more $5+ billion bids A non-blogging friend points me to the announcement today of Maryland’s subsidy bidthat puts Montgomery County into one of the 20 finalist slots. Shockingly, Governor Larry Hogan (R-MD) put in a bid that would pay Amazon almost the entire cost of its facility, depending on what you think a proper […]
(Dan here…late to post at AB…more on the way) by Kenneth Thomas Amazon moves closer to breaking the bank with “HQ2” Yesterday (Jan. 18), Amazon announced the 20 finalists for its “HQ2” project, that will supposedly create a second headquarters (why?) for the company somewhere in North America, most likely in the United States. With an alleged […]
Mother Jones tells the story here in graphic detail. The GOP’s Biggest Charter School Experiment Just Imploded How a washed-up lobbyist built a charter school empire and siphoned millions from public schools. “Now, with ECOT imploding, some state politicians have floated the idea that Lager, who has made millions in profits off the school and […]