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

Zombie EV sales

A commenter on AB recently noted that EVs are dead, to which I responded that there sure are a lot of zombie EVs here in East Providence. Kevin Drum has a post up about EVs showing that zombie EVs have been proliferating exponentially since 2011 and arithmetically since 2020. So many dead EVs. Who knew? […]

Election analysis from Heather Cox Richardson

Richardson has a post-election analysis up at her substack blog. Some money grafs: “In Virginia, Governor Glenn Youngkin campaigned hard to flip the state senate to the Republicans, telling voters that if his party had control of the whole government he would push through a measure banning abortion after 15 weeks. This has been a […]

Scenes from the October jobs report: soft landing vs. continued slow deceleration

Scenes from the October jobs report: soft landing vs. continued slow deceleration  – by New Deal democrat  First, an editorial note: economic news is light this week, so don’t be surprised if I play hooky for a day or two. That being said, let’s take a look at the most important trends, as I […]

Driverless cars

Count me among those who hope for the dawning of the driverless car age to happen soon. If I live long enough, the day will come when someone—my wife, my daughter—will extend their hand to demand the car keys. The prospect of being able to summon a driverless car to take me to the grocery […]

New Deal democrats Weekly Indicators for October 30 – November 3

Weekly Indicators for October 30 – November 3 at Seeking Alpha  – by New Deal democrat My Weekly Indicators post is up at Seeking Alpha. One way I keep track of the producer side of the economy is via the long leading indicator of corporate profits and the short leading indicator of the stock market. As […]

Legislation to Alleviate Administrative Burdens for Family Caregivers

To detail why this is so important, I turn to Doctor Barry J. Jacobs: “Caregivers, like marathon runners, must learn the lay of the land, find a sustainable pace and accept replenishment along their journey if they have any hope of gamely persevering from start to finish line. With this metaphor in mind, we can […]

Open Thread November 5 2023 Drift of Earth’s Pole

“Direct observational evidence supporting this estimate has been lacking. In this study, we show that the model estimate of water redistribution from aquifers to the oceans would result in a drift of Earth’s rotational pole, about 78.48 cm toward 64.16°E.” Drift of Earth’s Pole Confirms Groundwater Depletion as a Significant Contributor to Global Sea Level Rise […]

October jobs report: more deceleration, in the weakest report (except for June’s) since March 2021

New Deal democrat’s October Jobs report is again featured at Angry Bear. You can also pick-up the September 2023 Jobs Report from the link at the end of this report. This is the most complete monthly review on Unemployment Rate, average hourly earnings (minus management), which way job growth or decline is going, and a […]

Illegal immigration and Social Security/Medicare

In a previous post, I mentioned an effective way to curtail illegal immigration—require all employees to be screened through E-Verify—and some reasons why it won’t be adopted. Another disincentive to deterring illegal immigration is that it subsidizes Social Security and Medicare: “ . . . illegal immigrants as a group are net contributors who partially […]