Yes. Or any Palestinian in Israel. Or any Kurd or Armenian in Turkey. Or any Uyghur in China. Or any Jew in Europe, Russia or Ukraine. The difference is that in all these cases of “replacement theory” the ethnic cleansing isn’t theory, it’s fact. The theory that Whites are being replaced in the US is not even theory, it’s just racist propaganda.
I am getting comments from you in my inbox that do not appear on the thread linked to them (Goats and Dogs). I answered them best i could… on that thread. But something is wrong here. You may have more influence with management than I have.
Ron (RC) Weakley (A.K.A., Darryl For A While At EV) says:
No problem. Thanks for the update. My comments went off the proverbial rails (such as they were) on that thread. The short version is that our pseudo-intellectual banter is just for sport and/or working out with the grey matter, but the real work is doing what little that we can to get our guys elected in our own districts and states. In any case though, summer-ish weather has finally arrived here in central VA at least through the end of this weekend, so my time to burn is shot for now. Kudos to EMike for having figured that out long ago.
you are right about best use of time. “Tend your garden.” Mine got lost to inadequate due diligence, government regulations changed to benefit speculators, and country neighbors just as predatory as city folk.
As to getting people elected, that is also my prescription; but I have already put in my time in those trenches. I lack the political talent for even the grunt work.
As for pseudo intellectuals: I’m not over-fond of real intellectuals, if I have ever met one.
Ron (RC) Weakley (A.K.A., Darryl For A While At EV) says:
Yes, although it’s not limited to the GOP. Projection is a common tool of weak intellects and trolls. Of course, they don’t even know they’re doing it.
The reality, of course, is that the GOP right-wing (which is about 99% of the party) is evidently deep into fomenting conspiracies & is convinced that ‘everyone is out to get them’, and therefore, of course, conspiring against them.
Dems are nowhere near organized enough to do so, fortunately?
Ron (RC) Weakley (A.K.A., Darryl For A While At EV) says:
I did not know that the TV reality series The Biggest Loser was about politics. Not even Jenny Craig can save our two party system from its own excesses.
off-topic, but this is the first time any full month has topped 420 ppm:
https://www.co2.earth/ the curve is also getting steeper, ie, it’s getting worse faster than ever before… 425 ppm was supposed to be the tipping point…if so, we have less than two years to turn it around..
Ron (RC) Weakley (A.K.A., Darryl For A While At EV) says:
We may have just passed a point of no return when it comes to Earth’s climate.
The low point of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere typically occurs around the last week of September. But this year, levels of late have failed to drop below 400 parts per million (ppm) – and it looks like they’re not going to. …
The world’s most outspoken climatologist argues that today’s carbon dioxide levels are already dangerously too high. What can we do if he is right?
… James Hansen, director of the NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies, has been circulating a preprint of a journal paper saying that the outcome is likely to turn out worse than most people think. The most recent major report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change in 2007 projects a temperature rise of three degrees Celsius, plus or minus 1.5 degrees—enough to trigger serious impacts on human life from rising sea level, widespread drought, changes in weather patterns, and the like.
But according to Hansen and his nine co-authors, who have submitted their paper to Open Atmospheric Science Journal, the correct figure is closer to six degrees C. “That’s the equilibrium level,” he says. “We won’t get there for a while. But that’s where we’re aiming.” And although the full impact of this temperature increase will not be felt until the end of this century or even later, Hansen says, the point at which major climate disruption is inevitable is already upon us. “If humanity wishes to preserve a planet similar to that on which civilization developed and to which life on Earth is adapted,” the paper states, “CO2 will need to be reduced from its current 385 ppm [parts per million] to at most 350 ppm.” The situation, he says, “is much more sensitive than we had implicitly been assuming.” …
Ron (RC) Weakley (A.K.A., Darryl For A While At EV) says:
Correct on Open Thread. Not correct on an author’s post or him too. You can not hijack a subject related post and neither can anyone else. Haven’t said that in a while.
sounds good. but having been a victim of “hijack” (both as poster and as alleged hijacker) it depends on the “arbitrator’s” ability to tell the difference between a hijack and following a thread of thought to where it leads, even if it opens up a whole new level of analysis.
Ron (RC) Weakley (A.K.A., Darryl For A While At EV) says:
(AP) — First-term U.S. Rep. Madison Cawthorn conceded his Republican primary race Tuesday to state Sen. Chuck Edwards, ousting the pro-Donald Trump firebrand from Congress after his personal and political blunders translated into constituent unhappiness.
Cawthorn called Edwards to concede the 11th Congressional District primary to Edwards, Cawthorn campaign spokesperson Luke Ball told The Associated Press. ,,,
Last week TerraUSD, a stablecoin — a system that was supposed to perform a lot like a conventional bank account but was backed only by a cryptocurrency called Luna — collapsed. Luna lost 97 percent of its value over the course of just 24 hours, apparently destroying some investors’ life savings.
The event shook the crypto world in general, but the truth is that this world was looking pretty shaky even before the Terra disaster. Bitcoin, the original cryptocurrency, peaked last November and has since declined by more than 50 percent.
Here’s one way to think about that decline. Almost everyone is concerned about the rising cost of living; the Consumer Price Index — the cost of a representative basket of goods and services — has gone up about 4 percent over the past six months. But the cost of the same basket in Bitcoin has risen around 120 percent, which means inflation at an annualized rate of about 380 percent.
And other cryptocurrencies have performed far worse. Two cities — Miami and New York — have introduced their own cryptocurrencies, with enthusiastic support from their mayors. MiamiCoin is down more than 90 percent from its peak, and NewYorkCityCoin is down more than 80 percent. …
By now, we’ve all heard of them, but what exactly are cryptocurrencies? Many people — including, I fear, many people who have invested in them — probably still don’t fully understand them. Saying that they’re digital assets doesn’t really get at it. My bank account, which I mainly reach online, is also a digital asset, for all practical purposes.
What’s distinctive about cryptocurrencies is how ownership is established. I own the money in my bank account because the law says I do, and the bank enforces that legal claim by requiring, one way or another, that I prove that I am, in fact, me. Ownership of a crypto asset is established through what’s known as the blockchain, an encrypted (hence the name) digital record of all previous transfers of ownership that supposedly obviates the need for an external party, such as a bank, to validate a claim.
What’s the point of this kind of decentralized finance, and what purpose does it serve? Well, I’ll get to all that.
Though cryptocurrencies are currently way down, boosters — and as anyone who’s played in this space can tell you, there are few boosters quite as boosterish — will reassure you that this has happened before. Bitcoin, in particular, has always bounced back from previous dips, and investors who HODLed (held on for dear life to their coins, despite falling prices) have ended up with huge capital gains. But there are reasons to believe that this time may be different.
In the past, cryptocurrencies kept going up by attracting an ever-growing range of investors. Crypto was once held by a small clique that often had the feel of a cult, motivated in part by a combination of libertarian ideology and fascination with the clever use of technology. Over time, rising crypto prices drew in large numbers of additional investors and some big Wall Street money.
And in the past year or so, crypto marketing has gone really mainstream, with endorsements from celebrities — including Matt Damon, Kim Kardashian and Mike Tyson — not to mention political figures like Mayor Eric Adams of New York and the (unsuccessful) Republican Senate candidate Josh Mandel, who declared his intention to make Ohio “pro-God, pro-family, pro-Bitcoin.” Given all this, it’s hard to see who else there might be to recruit into crypto investing.
One disturbing aspect of this marketing push, by the way, is that those who bought cryptocurrencies relatively recently — and have therefore lost a lot of money in the crypto crash — probably consist disproportionately of the kind of people most likely to be influenced by celebrity endorsements. That is, they are probably poorer and less sophisticated than the average investor and badly positioned to handle the losses they’ve taken over the past few months.
In any case, as we look forward, the value of cryptocurrencies will have to rest on their underlying economic uses, which are …
Well, that’s just the thing. I’ve heard many discussions in which crypto supporters have been asked exactly what economic role crypto can play that isn’t more easily and cheaply achieved through other means — debit cards, Venmo, etc. Other than illegal transactions, in which crypto may sometimes offer anonymity, I have yet to hear a coherent answer.
As it is, cryptocurrencies play almost no role in economic transactions other than speculation in crypto markets themselves. And if your answer is “give it time,” you should bear in mind that Bitcoin has been around since 2009, which makes it ancient by tech standards; Apple introduced the iPad in 2010. If crypto was going to replace conventional money as a medium of exchange — a means of payment — surely we should have seen some signs of that happening by now. Just try paying for your groceries or other everyday goods using Bitcoin. It’s nearly impossible. …
PK: And in the past year or so, crypto marketing has gone really mainstream, with endorsements from celebrities — including Matt Damon, Kim Kardashian and Mike Tyson — not to mention political figures like Mayor Eric Adams of New York and the (unsuccessful) Republican Senate candidate Josh Mandel, who declared his intention to make Ohio “pro-God, pro-family, pro-Bitcoin.” Given all this, it’s hard to see who else there might be to recruit into crypto investing.
One disturbing aspect of this marketing push, by the way, is that those who bought cryptocurrencies relatively recently — and have therefore lost a lot of money in the crypto crash — probably consist disproportionately of the kind of people most likely to be influenced by celebrity endorsements. That is, they are probably poorer and less sophisticated than the average investor and badly positioned to handle the losses they’ve taken over the past few months.
In any case, as we look forward, the value of cryptocurrencies will have to rest on their underlying economic uses, which are …
Well, that’s just the thing. I’ve heard many discussions in which crypto supporters have been asked exactly what economic role crypto can play that isn’t more easily and cheaply achieved through other means — debit cards, Venmo, etc. Other than illegal transactions, in which crypto may sometimes offer anonymity, I have yet to hear a coherent answer.
As it is, cryptocurrencies play almost no role in economic transactions other than speculation in crypto markets themselves. …
… Fidelity’s proposed Wise Origin Bitcoin Trust would be an ETF or exchange-traded fund, which is a popular way for people to invest indirectly in stocks or commodities. Instead of purchasing bitcoin directly — a complicated and confusing process — an investor could simply buy ETF shares, which are pegged to the value of bitcoin traded on cryptocurrency exchanges. …
Bitcoin is down more than 16% this year, but that hasn’t dampened enthusiasm for the asset. That’s why Fidelity Investments is launching a bitcoin option for its 401(k) plans, but investors may still want to think long and hard about whether it’s for them.
The nation’s largest plan administrator said later this year, the 23,000 companies it manages retirement plans for will be able to offer their employees bitcoin as an investment choice. Investors would be able to allocate up to 20% of their 401(k) accounts to bitcoin, though employers will be able to lower that cap. …
Hmmm. Is it any coincidence that the Dobbs Index is also down ~16% for the year? Are any of those index funds that comprise much of the D.I. secretly involved in crypto? (I think not, but can one ever be sure?)
The proposal did not meet the standards designed to prevent fraudulent and manipulative practices and protect investors and the public interest, the regulator said.
The action is the latest in a series of rejections by the market regulator to approve an ETF that tracks the underlying digital asset, including one from SkyBridge last week. …
Just buy it, he seems to suggest; what are you, a wimp?
… There is something unseemly, to put it mildly, about the famous and fabulously wealthy urging crypto on their fans. Cryptocurrencies, after all, are in many cases not so much currencies as speculative thingamabobs — digital tokens whose value is predicated largely on the idea that someone will take them off your hands at a higher price than it cost you to acquire them. Entertainers and athletes have ample money to risk in speculative bubbles; their millions of admirers don’t have that luxury and may be left holding the bag when a bubble bursts. …
” . . . digital tokens whose value is predicated largely on the idea that someone will take them off your hands at a higher price than it cost you to acquire them.”
[ROTFLMAO! Other than??? Illegal drugs and human trafficking is exactly what one is investing in when they purchase cryptocurrencies. That is why Bitcoin has over the long run been so profitable. There never will be an honest way to obtain such returns on quasi-liquid investments. It is almost as good as buying land in South Africa and discovering diamonds on it, which is not at all liquid even when washed in blood.]
In Massachusetts, unemployment is at its lowest point since the pandemic began and the state’s coffers are overflowing. But a 40-year-high inflation rate — layered onto the state’s already high cost of living — is squeezing people in ways largely unseen in the rosier economic data, eroding their financial cushion and confidence in the economy. …
(A) poll in April found many residents already had a dim view of the country’s economic situation: Nearly 52 percent thought the economy is in a recession or a depression; just 18 percent believed we are in the midst of an “economic recovery.” That’s despite unemployment here dropping to 4.3 percent in March — the lowest rate in years, albeit still above the national mark of 3.6 percent.
A closely watched survey from the University of Michigan found that US consumer sentiment toward the economy in early May dipped to its lowest level since 2011. And in Massachusetts, the economy may already be slowing. The state’s real gross domestic product declined at a 1.0 percent annualized rate during the first three months of 2022, which MassBenchmarks attributed in part to a surge in COVID infections, the “effect of inflation on purchasing power, and weakening consumer and investor confidence.” …
It could have been a replay of 2008-2010 and years later. However, still much of this is a supply chain issue with business taking advantage leading to these issues. Wall Street did the same in 2008. Did Goldman Sachs really have to call its CDS from AIG? One Trading House had already collapsed.
Why is it Labor’s fault when Business gambles? Powell, Greenspan, and Bernanke punish Labor.
Foremostly it’s ‘circumstances’, in the form of a certain global pandemic, for which miraculous vaccines were created, and then objected to for dubious reasons that resonate with the right wing.
‘Desperate times call for desperate measures’, or so the MAGA people have told us. Not particularly a time for moderate solutions, or so it seems. But for the left to react strongly to the radical extremists of the right would only further piss them off, and we can’t risk that, in all probability. There may well be consequences of mild responses, however. Inevitability rules.
but not so desperate that we would wear masks or avoid crowds. not getting vaccinated may have contributed, but the vaccines were not available for at least a year into the pandemic, by which time it was too late to stop the spread.
even during the 1918 flu when some cities slowed the infection rate by mandatory social distancing the business owners howled about the effect of distancing on t”the economy” so the distancing wss rescinded and the number of deaths soared.
people never learn, and “business” makes it so.
as for not pissing off the right, i have been accused of that. but there is a difference between enforcing masks and distancing and forcing vaccination or just calling people names. any kind of rational leadership could have enforced masks and distancing, but in America today there is no rational leadership. The Dems can’t lead, and the R’s only lead to destruction.
it seems to me that when unemployment falls and prices rise, people object to having to pay a little more to support an economy where more people have at least enough.
(try) to put it another way: people who did not have jobs before get jobs, increasing demand for some goods, causing prices to rise, causing people who had jobs before to be able to buy less (grammar?: not that they become able to buy less, but that they become unable to buy as much}/
this is not the whole story, but looks from here like part of it. it would also be true that if people who had no money were given money by the government so that they could buy enough to live, that would increase demand and cause prices to rise (something Summers objects to), unless the money given to the poor was subtracted from the money the rich had to spend by taxing the rich, which of course is a crime, or the government just printed the money, which would cause inflation, which is just a cheap way to tax everyone that would fall more heavily on the poor than the rich, i think this inflation would not be the same thing as the price rise resulting from poor people having more money, but i am not sure that respected economists would agree with me.
The world economy is heading into a potentially grim period as rising costs, shortages of food and other commodities and Russia’s continuing invasion of Ukraine threaten to slow economic growth and bring about a painful global slump.
Two years after the coronavirus pandemic emerged and left much of the globe in a state of paralysis, policymakers are grappling with ongoing challenges, including clogged supply chains, lockdowns in China and the prospect of an energy crisis as nations wean themselves off Russian oil and gas. Those colliding forces have some economists starting to worry about a global recession as different corners of the world find their economies battered by events.
Finding ways to avoid a slowdown while continuing to exert pressure on Russia for its war in Ukraine will be the primary focus of finance ministers from the Group of 7 nations who are convening in Bonn, Germany, this week.
At a news conference on Wednesday, Treasury Secretary Janet L. Yellen said that elevated food and energy prices were depressing both spending and economic output, creating what she called “stagflationary effects” all around the world. …
“This is an environment that is filled with risks, both with respect to inflation, and also potential slowdowns,” Ms. Yellen said.
The economic challenges that governments around the globe are facing could begin to chip away at the united front that Western nations have maintained in confronting Russia’s aggression, including sweeping sanctions aimed at crippling its economy and efforts to reduce reliance on Russian energy.
Policymakers are balancing delicate trade-offs as they consider how to isolate Russia, support Ukraine and keep their own economies afloat at a moment when prices are rising rapidly and growth is slowing.
Central banks around the world are beginning to raise interest rates to help tame rapid inflation, moves that will temper economic growth by raising borrowing costs and could lead to higher unemployment. Christine Lagarde, president of the European Central Bank, last week signaled a possible increase in interest rates in July, which would be the ECB’s first such move in more than a decade.
On Monday, the European Commission released its own revised economic forecast, showing a slowdown in growth to 2.7 percent this year from the 4 percent estimated in its winter report. At the same time, inflation is hitting record levels and is expected to average 6.8 percent for the year. Britain’s annual inflation rate jumped to 9 percent last month, the highest in 40 years, the Office for National Statistics said on Wednesday. And some Eastern European countries face even steeper price increases, with Poland, Estonia, the Czech Republic, Bulgaria and Lithuania all facing inflation rates in excess of 11 percent.
Pressures on global supply chains also worsened in April as the Russian invasion of Ukraine and pandemic lockdowns in China made it more difficult for companies to source parts and products globally, a supply chain index published Wednesday by the Federal Reserve Bank of New York showed. That could further exacerbate shortages and price increases.
Eswar Prasad, the former head of the International Monetary Fund’s China division, summed up the challenges facing the G7 nations, saying that its “policymakers are caught in the bind that any tightening of screws on Russia by limiting energy purchases worsens inflation and hurts growth in their economies.”
“Such sanctions, for all the moral justification underpinning them, are exacting an increasingly heavy economic toll that in turn could have domestic political consequences for G7 leaders,” he added.
Still, the United States is expected to press its allies to continue isolating Russia and to deliver more economic aid to Ukraine despite their own economic troubles. Officials are also expected to discuss the merits of imposing tariffs on Russian energy exports ahead of a proposed European oil embargo that the United States fears could send prices skyrocketing by limiting supplies. Policymakers will also discuss whether to press countries such as India to roll back export restrictions on crucial food products that are worsening already high prices.
Against this backdrop is the growing urgency to help sustain Ukraine’s economy, which the International Monetary Fund has said needs an estimated $5 billion a month in aid to keep government operations running. The U.S. Congress is close to passing a $40 billion aid package for Ukraine that will cover some of these costs, but Ms. Yellen has called on her European counterparts to provide more financial help.
Finance ministers are expected to consider other measures for providing Ukraine with relief.
There is increasing interest in the idea of seizing some of the approximately $300 billion in Russian central bank reserves that the United States and its allies have immobilized and using that money to help fund Ukraine’s reconstruction. Treasury Department officials are considering the idea, but they have trepidations about the feasibility of such a move and the possibility that it would raise doubts about the United States as a safe place to store assets. …
On Wednesday, Ms. Yellen dismissed the likelihood of such a move when she said liquidating Russian assets is “not something that is legally permissible in the United States.”
Ahead of the G7 meeting this week, American officials saw the economic challenges facing Europe firsthand. During a stop to meet with top officials in Warsaw on Monday, Ms. Yellen acknowledged the toll that the conflict in Ukraine is having on the economy of Poland, where officials have raised interest rates sharply to combat inflation. Poland has absorbed more than three million Ukrainian refugees and has faced a cutoff in gas exports from Russia.
“They have to deal with a tighter monetary policy just as countries around the world and the United States are,” Ms. Yellen told reporters. “At a time when Poland is committed to large expenditures to shore up its security, it is a difficult balancing act.”
A downturn may be unavoidable in some countries, and economists are weighing multiple factors as they gauge the likelihood of a recession, including a severe slowdown in China related to continuing Covid lockdowns.
The European Commission, in its economic report, said the E.U. “is first in line among advanced economies to take a hit,” because of its proximity to Ukraine and its dependence on Russian energy. At the same time, it has absorbed more than five million refugees in less than three months. …
I am at a complete loss as to how raising interest rates will improve the economy at a time the economy is slowing.
prices are rising because of “shortages” honest or predatory or as a result of war.
suggests to me that MORE investment might be needed, not less. or at least that higer prices reflect a natural consequence of reduced supply, not “excessive” demand, as in “taking the punch bowl away just as the party is getting started.”
Ron (RC) Weakley (A.K.A., Darryl For A While At EV) says:
When the Fed raises interest rates, then it only directly affects inter-bank lending and by virtue of a fixed index the prime rate charged businesses with good credit on short term loans. Secondarily, then several variable rates for charge cards and longer term loans are indexed off prime rate, but that is a choice made by both the lender and the borrower in their specific loan contract. Large investments made by businesses are financed in the bond market, where prices are only indirectly related to the Fed rate by virtue of their mutual (but not interdependent) relationship to inflation rates. Take as evidence rates from 2006. The Fed had been raising rates for two years by mid-2006 but mortgage rates had continued to stay level and at times fall even further during those two years because of the huge competition created by online lenders and the general attitude towards rising property value alongside low returns on investments imagined to be riskier than the mortgage bond market.
That said, then for multiple reasons a diversion between the Fed and bond markets may lead to bigger problems down the road, but not always. With stock prices falling then safe bond prices may rise (rising price for bonds means lower returns). The problem there is what bond markets might consider safe. With all the interesting economic problems that we are facing, the corporate bond markets will be picking winners and losers. Mortgage default rates are likely expected to rise, so mortgage bonds will get cheaper raising the interest rates on real estate.
Well, that is how it works, but I am not in anyway attached to investment markets. So, I may have missed an important detail leading to different expectations. In any case, the chattering classes are not a reliable source.
Ron (RC) Weakley (A.K.A., Darryl For A While At EV) says:
BTW, US Treasuries have always been considered safest of the safe rates in bond markets, but Republicans have signaled their willingness to destroy that safety by not raising the debt ceiling a few times now.
thanks for the education. I think it may be too late for me to ever really understand rhw real-world bond market. I just react to the published conventional wisdom that raising interest rates is the remedy for inflation.
as a typical dumb citizen i’d like a way to protect my savings from inflation. I never expected to get rich. It seems to me that since I began to pay attention in about 1980 interest on safe savings has never kept up with inflation. Except in the case of Social Security where it isn’t called “interest,” and even there the politicians have been trying to kill the protections built in by pay as you go financing, both as to initial benefit and cost of living adjustments.
and while writing that i realized i have lost my verbal facility with SS matters. Time for me to go. leave it up to the ignorant and the greedy to work out themselves.
Russia’s military failure in Ukraine has defied almost everyone’s predictions. First came abject defeat at the gates of Kyiv. Then came the incredible shrinking blitzkrieg, as attempts to encircle Ukrainian forces in the supposedly more favorable terrain in the east have devolved into a slow-motion battle of attrition.
What’s important about this second Russian setback is that it interacts with another big surprise: The remarkable — and, in some ways, puzzling — effectiveness, at least so far, of Western economic sanctions against the Putin regime, sanctions that are working in an unexpected way.
As soon as the war began there was a great deal of talk about bringing economic pressure to bear against the invading nation. Most of this focused on ways to cut off Russia’s exports, especially its sales of oil and natural gas. Unfortunately, however, there has been shamefully little meaningful movement on that front. The Biden administration has banned imports of Russian oil, but this will have little impact unless other nations follow our lead. And Europe, in particular, still hasn’t placed an embargo on Russian oil, let alone done anything substantive to wean itself from dependence on Russian gas.
As a result, Russian exports have held up, and the country appears to be headed for a record trade surplus. So is Vladimir Putin winning the economic war? …
No, he’s losing it. That surging surplus is a sign of weakness, not strength — it largely reflects a plunge in Russia’s imports, which even state-backed analysts say is hobbling its economy. Russia is, in effect, making a lot of money selling oil and gas, but finding it hard to use that money to buy the things it needs, reportedly including crucial components used in the production of tanks and other military equipment.
Why is Russia apparently having so much trouble buying stuff? Part of the answer is that many of the world’s democracies have banned sales to Russia of a variety of goods — weapons, of course, but also industrial components that can, directly or indirectly, be used to produce weapons.
However, that can’t be the whole story, because Russia seems to have lost access to imports even from countries that aren’t imposing sanctions. Matt Klein of the blog The Overshoot estimates that in March, exports from allied democracies to Russia were down 53 percent from normal levels (and early indications are that they fell further in April). But exports from neutral or pro-Russian countries, including China, were down almost as much — 45 percent.
Some of this may, as Klein has suggested, reflect fear, even in non-allied countries, of “being on the wrong side of sanctions.” Imagine yourself as the chief executive of a Chinese company that relies on components produced in South Korea, Japan or the United States. If you make sales to Russia that might be seen as helping Putin’s war effort, wouldn’t you worry about facing sanctions yourself?
Sanctions on Russia’s financial system, such as the freezing of the central bank’s reserves and the exclusion of some major private banks from international payment systems, may also be crimping imports. Hard currency may be flowing into Russia, but using that currency to buy things abroad has become difficult. You can’t conduct modern business with suitcases full of $100 bills. …
No, he’s losing it. That surging surplus is a sign of weakness, not strength — it largely reflects a plunge in Russia’s imports, which even state-backed analysts say is hobbling its economy. Russia is, in effect, making a lot of money selling oil and gas, but finding it hard to use that money to buy the things it needs, reportedly including crucial components used in the production of tanks and other military equipment.
Why is Russia apparently having so much trouble buying stuff? Part of the answer is that many of the world’s democracies have banned sales to Russia of a variety of goods — weapons, of course, but also industrial components that can, directly or indirectly, be used to produce weapons.
However, that can’t be the whole story, because Russia seems to have lost access to imports even from countries that aren’t imposing sanctions. Matt Klein of the blog The Overshoot estimates that in March, exports from allied democracies to Russia were down 53 percent from normal levels (and early indications are that they fell further in April). But exports from neutral or pro-Russian countries, including China, were down almost as much — 45 percent.
Some of this may, as Klein has suggested, reflect fear, even in non-allied countries, of “being on the wrong side of sanctions.” Imagine yourself as the chief executive of a Chinese company that relies on components produced in South Korea, Japan or the United States. If you make sales to Russia that might be seen as helping Putin’s war effort, wouldn’t you worry about facing sanctions yourself?
Sanctions on Russia’s financial system, such as the freezing of the central bank’s reserves and the exclusion of some major private banks from international payment systems, may also be crimping imports. Hard currency may be flowing into Russia, but using that currency to buy things abroad has become difficult. You can’t conduct modern business with suitcases full of $100 bills.
Now, it’s possible, even likely, that over time Russia will find workarounds that bypass Western sanctions. But time is one thing Putin doesn’t seem to have.
As I said, the war in Ukraine appears to have devolved into a battle of attrition, and that’s not a battle Putin seems likely to win: Russia has suffered huge equipment losses that it won’t be able to replace any time soon, while Ukraine is receiving large equipment inflows from the West. This war may well be over, and not to Putin’s advantage, before Russia finds ways around Western sanctions.
One final point: The effect of sanctions on Russia offers a graphic, if grisly, demonstration of a point economists often try to make, but rarely manage to get across: Imports, not exports, are the point of international trade.
That is, the benefits of trade shouldn’t be measured by the jobs and incomes created in export industries; those workers could, after all, be doing something else. The gains from trade come, instead, from the useful goods and services other countries provide to your citizens. And running a trade surplus isn’t a “win”; if anything, it means that you’re giving the world more than you get, receiving nothing but i.o.u.s in return.
Yes, I know that in practice there are caveats and complications to these statements. Trade surpluses can sometimes help boost a weak economy, and while imports make a nation richer, they may displace and impoverish some workers. But what’s happening to Russia illustrates their essential truth. Russia’s trade surplus is a sign of weakness, not strength; its exports are (alas) holding up well despite its pariah status, but its economy is being crippled by a cutoff of imports.
And this in turn means that Putin is losing the economic as well as the military war.
Replacement theory is fact-based, but the facts have been confused. It has been going on for almost 200 years. Just ask any Cherokee.
@Ron,
Yes. Or any Palestinian in Israel. Or any Kurd or Armenian in Turkey. Or any Uyghur in China. Or any Jew in Europe, Russia or Ukraine. The difference is that in all these cases of “replacement theory” the ethnic cleansing isn’t theory, it’s fact. The theory that Whites are being replaced in the US is not even theory, it’s just racist propaganda.
True and a scare tactic to get a reaction as seen in Buffalo. Unless they isolate him, he will be dead within a year.
Of course they will isolate him. In terms of the second sentence: Who cares?
EM
The point being, these morons do not know what is waiting for them. I do and have seen it. This is a lost human due to political lies.
Ron,
As Joel notes, the Cherokee replacement was real. But they won their case in the Supreme Court.
Cob,
:<)
Ron,
I am getting comments from you in my inbox that do not appear on the thread linked to them (Goats and Dogs). I answered them best i could… on that thread. But something is wrong here. You may have more influence with management than I have.
Coberly,
No problem. Thanks for the update. My comments went off the proverbial rails (such as they were) on that thread. The short version is that our pseudo-intellectual banter is just for sport and/or working out with the grey matter, but the real work is doing what little that we can to get our guys elected in our own districts and states. In any case though, summer-ish weather has finally arrived here in central VA at least through the end of this weekend, so my time to burn is shot for now. Kudos to EMike for having figured that out long ago.
Ron
you are right about best use of time. “Tend your garden.” Mine got lost to inadequate due diligence, government regulations changed to benefit speculators, and country neighbors just as predatory as city folk.
As to getting people elected, that is also my prescription; but I have already put in my time in those trenches. I lack the political talent for even the grunt work.
As for pseudo intellectuals: I’m not over-fond of real intellectuals, if I have ever met one.
Coberly,
Take care.
‘Projection’ is what GOPsters do, also conspiracies.
@Fred,
Yes, although it’s not limited to the GOP. Projection is a common tool of weak intellects and trolls. Of course, they don’t even know they’re doing it.
That has to be a major symptom of Dunning-Kruger Syndrome.
The reality, of course, is that the GOP right-wing (which is about 99% of the party) is evidently deep into fomenting conspiracies & is convinced that ‘everyone is out to get them’, and therefore, of course, conspiring against them.
Dems are nowhere near organized enough to do so, fortunately?
I did not know that the TV reality series The Biggest Loser was about politics. Not even Jenny Craig can save our two party system from its own excesses.
“Of course, they don’t even know they are doing it.”
off-topic, but this is the first time any full month has topped 420 ppm:
https://www.co2.earth/ the curve is also getting steeper, ie, it’s getting worse faster than ever before… 425 ppm was supposed to be the tipping point…if so, we have less than two years to turn it around..
rjs,
This is the Open thread, Dude. How can you be off topic? Just don’t post porn and you are good.
Safe Carbon Levels in the Atmosphere Are Now a Thing of the Past
US News – September 2016
Global Warming: Beyond the Tipping Point
Scientific American – September 2008
Fred,
THANKS.
Hansen may not be the singular absolute best authority on climate science, but he is damned close to it – close enough for government work.
Ron:
Correct on Open Thread. Not correct on an author’s post or him too. You can not hijack a subject related post and neither can anyone else. Haven’t said that in a while.
Run
sounds good. but having been a victim of “hijack” (both as poster and as alleged hijacker) it depends on the “arbitrator’s” ability to tell the difference between a hijack and following a thread of thought to where it leads, even if it opens up a whole new level of analysis.
Cob,
Exactly in the real world, but we are here – not there.
Yes!
N. Carolina Representative Cawthorn concedes GOP primary to Edwards
Boston Globe – May 17
(AP) — First-term U.S. Rep. Madison Cawthorn conceded his Republican primary race Tuesday to state Sen. Chuck Edwards, ousting the pro-Donald Trump firebrand from Congress after his personal and political blunders translated into constituent unhappiness.
Cawthorn called Edwards to concede the 11th Congressional District primary to Edwards, Cawthorn campaign spokesperson Luke Ball told The Associated Press. ,,,
Crashing Crypto: Is This Time Different?
NY Times – Paul Krugman – May 17
fool, money, parted, etc.
So Bitcoin is more like a stock than a currency?
Or more like a tulip.
Can you pay your taxes with it?
PK: And in the past year or so, crypto marketing has gone really mainstream, with endorsements from celebrities — including Matt Damon, Kim Kardashian and Mike Tyson — not to mention political figures like Mayor Eric Adams of New York and the (unsuccessful) Republican Senate candidate Josh Mandel, who declared his intention to make Ohio “pro-God, pro-family, pro-Bitcoin.” Given all this, it’s hard to see who else there might be to recruit into crypto investing.
One disturbing aspect of this marketing push, by the way, is that those who bought cryptocurrencies relatively recently — and have therefore lost a lot of money in the crypto crash — probably consist disproportionately of the kind of people most likely to be influenced by celebrity endorsements. That is, they are probably poorer and less sophisticated than the average investor and badly positioned to handle the losses they’ve taken over the past few months.
In any case, as we look forward, the value of cryptocurrencies will have to rest on their underlying economic uses, which are …
Well, that’s just the thing. I’ve heard many discussions in which crypto supporters have been asked exactly what economic role crypto can play that isn’t more easily and cheaply achieved through other means — debit cards, Venmo, etc. Other than illegal transactions, in which crypto may sometimes offer anonymity, I have yet to hear a coherent answer.
As it is, cryptocurrencies play almost no role in economic transactions other than speculation in crypto markets themselves. …
Alas…
Fidelity wants to make it easier for investors to buy into bitcoin
Boston Globe – March 2021
… Fidelity’s proposed Wise Origin Bitcoin Trust would be an ETF or exchange-traded fund, which is a popular way for people to invest indirectly in stocks or commodities. Instead of purchasing bitcoin directly — a complicated and confusing process — an investor could simply buy ETF shares, which are pegged to the value of bitcoin traded on cryptocurrency exchanges. …
Fidelity plans to offer bitcoin in its 401(k) retirement funds
USA Today – May 3, 2022
Bitcoin is down more than 16% this year, but that hasn’t dampened enthusiasm for the asset. That’s why Fidelity Investments is launching a bitcoin option for its 401(k) plans, but investors may still want to think long and hard about whether it’s for them.
The nation’s largest plan administrator said later this year, the 23,000 companies it manages retirement plans for will be able to offer their employees bitcoin as an investment choice. Investors would be able to allocate up to 20% of their 401(k) accounts to bitcoin, though employers will be able to lower that cap. …
Hmmm. Is it any coincidence that the Dobbs Index is also down ~16% for the year? Are any of those index funds that comprise much of the D.I. secretly involved in crypto? (I think not, but can one ever be sure?)
BTW…
SEC rejects Fidelity’s Wise Origin bitcoin ETF
Reuters – Jan 26, 2022
The proposal did not meet the standards designed to prevent fraudulent and manipulative practices and protect investors and the public interest, the regulator said.
The action is the latest in a series of rejections by the market regulator to approve an ETF that tracks the underlying digital asset, including one from SkyBridge last week. …
Why Is Matt Damon Shilling for Crypto?
NY Times magazine – February 2
Just buy it, he seems to suggest; what are you, a wimp?
… There is something unseemly, to put it mildly, about the famous and fabulously wealthy urging crypto on their fans. Cryptocurrencies, after all, are in many cases not so much currencies as speculative thingamabobs — digital tokens whose value is predicated largely on the idea that someone will take them off your hands at a higher price than it cost you to acquire them. Entertainers and athletes have ample money to risk in speculative bubbles; their millions of admirers don’t have that luxury and may be left holding the bag when a bubble bursts. …
” . . . digital tokens whose value is predicated largely on the idea that someone will take them off your hands at a higher price than it cost you to acquire them.”
The Greater Fool Theory of investment.
Warhol’s ‘Marilyn,’ at $195 Million, Shatters Auction Record
Also explains the rconomics of art.
“…Other than illegal transactions…”???
[ROTFLMAO! Other than??? Illegal drugs and human trafficking is exactly what one is investing in when they purchase cryptocurrencies. That is why Bitcoin has over the long run been so profitable. There never will be an honest way to obtain such returns on quasi-liquid investments. It is almost as good as buying land in South Africa and discovering diamonds on it, which is not at all liquid even when washed in blood.]
Jimmy Carter redux?
Inflation is hitting Mass. residents painfully hard
Boston Globe – May 16
It could have been a replay of 2008-2010 and years later. However, still much of this is a supply chain issue with business taking advantage leading to these issues. Wall Street did the same in 2008. Did Goldman Sachs really have to call its CDS from AIG? One Trading House had already collapsed.
Why is it Labor’s fault when Business gambles? Powell, Greenspan, and Bernanke punish Labor.
Carter or Burns?
Foremostly it’s ‘circumstances’, in the form of a certain global pandemic, for which miraculous vaccines were created, and then objected to for dubious reasons that resonate with the right wing.
‘Desperate times call for desperate measures’, or so the MAGA people have told us. Not particularly a time for moderate solutions, or so it seems. But for the left to react strongly to the radical extremists of the right would only further piss them off, and we can’t risk that, in all probability. There may well be consequences of mild responses, however. Inevitability rules.
desperate times desperate measures
but not so desperate that we would wear masks or avoid crowds. not getting vaccinated may have contributed, but the vaccines were not available for at least a year into the pandemic, by which time it was too late to stop the spread.
even during the 1918 flu when some cities slowed the infection rate by mandatory social distancing the business owners howled about the effect of distancing on t”the economy” so the distancing wss rescinded and the number of deaths soared.
people never learn, and “business” makes it so.
as for not pissing off the right, i have been accused of that. but there is a difference between enforcing masks and distancing and forcing vaccination or just calling people names. any kind of rational leadership could have enforced masks and distancing, but in America today there is no rational leadership. The Dems can’t lead, and the R’s only lead to destruction.
it seems to me that when unemployment falls and prices rise, people object to having to pay a little more to support an economy where more people have at least enough.
(try) to put it another way: people who did not have jobs before get jobs, increasing demand for some goods, causing prices to rise, causing people who had jobs before to be able to buy less (grammar?: not that they become able to buy less, but that they become unable to buy as much}/
this is not the whole story, but looks from here like part of it. it would also be true that if people who had no money were given money by the government so that they could buy enough to live, that would increase demand and cause prices to rise (something Summers objects to), unless the money given to the poor was subtracted from the money the rich had to spend by taxing the rich, which of course is a crime, or the government just printed the money, which would cause inflation, which is just a cheap way to tax everyone that would fall more heavily on the poor than the rich, i think this inflation would not be the same thing as the price rise resulting from poor people having more money, but i am not sure that respected economists would agree with me.
Economic Headwinds Mount as Leaders Weigh Costs of Confronting Russia
NY Times – May 18
I am at a complete loss as to how raising interest rates will improve the economy at a time the economy is slowing.
prices are rising because of “shortages” honest or predatory or as a result of war.
suggests to me that MORE investment might be needed, not less. or at least that higer prices reflect a natural consequence of reduced supply, not “excessive” demand, as in “taking the punch bowl away just as the party is getting started.”
Coberly,
When the Fed raises interest rates, then it only directly affects inter-bank lending and by virtue of a fixed index the prime rate charged businesses with good credit on short term loans. Secondarily, then several variable rates for charge cards and longer term loans are indexed off prime rate, but that is a choice made by both the lender and the borrower in their specific loan contract. Large investments made by businesses are financed in the bond market, where prices are only indirectly related to the Fed rate by virtue of their mutual (but not interdependent) relationship to inflation rates. Take as evidence rates from 2006. The Fed had been raising rates for two years by mid-2006 but mortgage rates had continued to stay level and at times fall even further during those two years because of the huge competition created by online lenders and the general attitude towards rising property value alongside low returns on investments imagined to be riskier than the mortgage bond market.
That said, then for multiple reasons a diversion between the Fed and bond markets may lead to bigger problems down the road, but not always. With stock prices falling then safe bond prices may rise (rising price for bonds means lower returns). The problem there is what bond markets might consider safe. With all the interesting economic problems that we are facing, the corporate bond markets will be picking winners and losers. Mortgage default rates are likely expected to rise, so mortgage bonds will get cheaper raising the interest rates on real estate.
Well, that is how it works, but I am not in anyway attached to investment markets. So, I may have missed an important detail leading to different expectations. In any case, the chattering classes are not a reliable source.
BTW, US Treasuries have always been considered safest of the safe rates in bond markets, but Republicans have signaled their willingness to destroy that safety by not raising the debt ceiling a few times now.
Ron
thanks for the education. I think it may be too late for me to ever really understand rhw real-world bond market. I just react to the published conventional wisdom that raising interest rates is the remedy for inflation.
as a typical dumb citizen i’d like a way to protect my savings from inflation. I never expected to get rich. It seems to me that since I began to pay attention in about 1980 interest on safe savings has never kept up with inflation. Except in the case of Social Security where it isn’t called “interest,” and even there the politicians have been trying to kill the protections built in by pay as you go financing, both as to initial benefit and cost of living adjustments.
and while writing that i realized i have lost my verbal facility with SS matters. Time for me to go. leave it up to the ignorant and the greedy to work out themselves.
How the West Is Strangling Putin’s Economy
NY Times – Paul Krugman – May 19