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

Healthcare Workers Union Pushing Medicaid Expansion in States

Oklahoma If you remember, I wrote about Oklahoma squeaking through its own initiative to expand Medicaid for low-income people. In theory, the state will be in the driver’s seat (mostly) in deciding how much money it will allocate to the program rather than the Federal government. Political interests will have a difficult time killing Medicaid without […]

Elites versus the public on renaming army bases

According to the Washington Post: Half of Americans oppose renaming military bases currently named after Confederate generals, while 42 percent support the changes. Once again there is a significant partisan split, with 81 percent of Republicans and 50 percent of independents opposed and 66 percent of Democrats in favor. A majority of Americans ages 50 and older are opposed […]

Interpol Supports Murder Charge Against MbS

Interpol Supports Murder Charge Against MbS  In today’s Washington Post David Ignatius reports that Interpol refused a request from Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman (MbS) to extradite Saad Aljabri to Saudi Arabia from Canada in 2017. MbS had been trying to entice Aljabri to return and had arrested his children, who remain arrested despite […]

Initial and continuing jobless claims: back to being “less awful”

Initial and continuing jobless claims: back to being “less awful” This morning’s initial and continued jobless claims resume the trend of “less awful” numbers. New jobless claims fell to under 1,000,000 for the first time on an un-adjusted basis – 984,192, to be specific (gold in the graph below). After seasonal adjustment, they declined 249,000 […]

July jobs report: a very good *relative* gain – perhaps the last

July jobs report: a very good *relative* gain – perhaps the last HEADLINES: 1,763,000 million jobs gained. Together with the gains of May and June, this makes up about 42% of the 22.1 million job losses in March and April. U3 unemployment rate declined -0.9% from 11.1% to 10.2%, compared with the January low of 3.5%. […]

How To Measure Quarterly Changes In GDP Can Make A Big Difference

How To Measure Quarterly Changes In GDP Can Make A Big Difference We have had dramatic headlines and commentary in recent days since the BEA issued its initial estimate of quarterly changes in GDP, which they do not officially measure on an shorter time period. This is a measure of the average GDP in one […]