Scenes from the December jobs report: leading jobs sectors and wages Let’s take a more detailed look at last Friday’s December jobs report. First, as usual for the past few months, let’s look at the more leading jobs sectors. This month, let’s also take a more detailed look at wage growth and why it may […]
Live-blogging the Fifteenth Amendment: January 7 and 11, 1869 January 7: Remarks by Rep. Benjamin M. Boyer, Democrat from Pennsylvania: Mr. Chairman, the issues supposed to have been settled by the election of General Grant to the Presidency formed the subject of an elaborate speech by the honorable gentleman from Maine [Mr. Blaine] a few […]
The 2020 Electoral College playing field expands for Democrats Polling firm Morning Consult has an interactive graph measuring Trump approval by State for each month since January 2016. You can visit it here. The map has some interesting insights for the 2020 Presidential election race. In the first place, while it would be too cumbersome to […]
January’s reports start out with a decidedly mixed picture for 2020 We have our first bits of forward-looking data for the year: November residential construction, December ISM manufacturing, and December light vehicle sales. They paint a decidedly mixed picture. Let’s take a look in order. Residential construction spending improved by a strong 1.9% in November. […]
Republics and the war-making power In view of the militry carrying out Trump’s order to kill an Iranian general, I thought I would weigh in on the issue of the war-making power historically by republics. I don’t have much to add to the substance of the immediate debate. Killing an Iranian general was certainly an […]
Initial jobless claims still negative, but no recession signal As you know, I’ve been monitoring initial jobless claims closely for the past several months, to see if there are any signs of a slowdown turning into something worse. Simply put, if businesses aren’t laying employees off, those same people are consumers who are going to […]
The chart of the decade Today doesn’t just mark the end of 2019, but the end of the 2010’s as well. So it’s only suitable that I post the one chart that I think most explains the economy over the past 10 years. In terms of public policy, that chart would be of the continual […]
A response to Kevin Drum: for wages and inflation, it’s all about the price of gas Last week Kevin Drum had the following inquiry: [H]ow is it that wages can go up but overall inflation remains so subdued? That seems to be the real disconnect here. During the dotcom boom, wages went up but inflation remained […]
A roadmap to a Democratic Senate supermajority A worthy criticism made by many observers on the Democratic side is that most of the plans being painstakingly described by the Presidential candidates will come to nothing, because the filibuster in the Senate will kill them all. The GOP will then run on the “do nothing” socialist […]
Happy [insert name of preferred religious holiday here]! 3 quick hits I’ll be traveling and enjoying the holiday for a few days, so … light to non-existent posting! In the meantime, three quick hits for you: 1. New home sales – continued strength in this very forward looking sector. Even though sales declined m/m, the […]