Trump’s base: not the white working class, but white evangelicals — all men and lesser-educated women — who believe the ends justify the means Via Digby: __________________ 1. Trump has always been unpopular with college-educated voters [A] Pew Research assessment … [using a] validated voter survey (they matched voter file with the survey respondents) showed white women narrowly preferring […]

Comments on personal consumption expenditures: the September anomaly and the Fed’s 2% inflation ceiliing Let me make a few comments on yesterday’s (Aug. 30) report on personal income and spending. Well, actually, just the spending part for now. First, there is a long-time relationship going back 60 years in the data whereby the YoY% growth […]

Corporate profits after taxes set a new record. But the Fed is worried about wages Yesterday  (Aug. 29) in the Q2 GDP update corporate profits were reported for the first time. Since corporate profits are one of four long leading indicators identified by Prof. Geoffrey Moore, I have updated my look at them at Seeking Alpha. […]

House prices continue to rise, exacerbating unaffordability Now that we have both the Case Shiller and FHFA house price reports for June, let’s take a look at how they fit in to the overall market, and in particular on housing affordability. To begin with, let me repeat the general formula for the housing market: interest […]

What the compressed yield curve means for employment Aside from the threat of a recession down the road, is there cause for concern by economic Progressives in the fact that the yield curve has tightened (i.e., the difference in interest rates between long and short term bonds has become very small)? In a word, Yes. […]

A new risk at the Fed: Donald Trump’s power to fire Fed Governors Calling it “breaking with decades of presidential convention,” the New York Times reported last week on Donald Trump’s open criticism of recent Federal Reserve rate hikes. quoting him as telling donors at a  fund-raiser in the Hamptons: that he had expected Mr. Powell to […]

Is the rental vacancy rate a leading signal for the housing market? Here is something I noticed while putting together my piece yesterday on the housing market. Three of the series — new home sales, existing home sales, and single family starts — all peaked last November: That made me go back and think about […]

Pew Charitable Trust confirms the “rental (and ownership) affordability crisis” In case you thought I was talking through my hat about the general lack of affordability of all types of housing, including both owning and renting, the Pew Charitable Trust has also stepped up with a nearly identical analysis.  Go read the whole thing, but here are […]

Can the Fed successfully steer between Scylla and Charybdis? An update As I type this, the spread between 2 year and 10 year Treasuries is back to 0.25%, the level below which I switch my rating on the yield curve from positive to neutral. Already the spread is tight enough that, even if it never […]

(Dan here…a little late posting,,,my fault) A graph for Sunday: 2012 Obama voters by 2016 vote  – by New Deal democrat This is a graph I’ve been meaning to comment on, that I saw on Vox.com a couple of weeks ago. It breaks down Obama voters from 2012 based on who they voted for in […]