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

Economically weighted ISM services + manufacturing warrant Recession Watch

 – by New Deal democrat Last month I concluded my report on the economically weighted ISM manufacturing and services indexes by writing “new orders for the entire economy are tight on the cusp of tipping into contraction.” This month, they did, warranting a “Recession Watch.” To recap, because manufacturing is much less important to the economy […]

Elections in Eastern Europe

Asia is a world apart from Europe or North America. I am curious as to what people are thinking about in Asia when they view the news from either country. I have traveled extensively in Thailand and China as well as Europe. Much of the time, I was there for weeks. There are always questions […]

April personal income and spending: the last positive front-running report?

 – by New Deal democrat We finish the month of May with the very important personal income and spending for April, which gives us a thorough look at the consumer. In this case it is particularly complicated by the fact that “Liberation Day” tariffs and various further retaliatory increases were imposed at various times during the […]

Tariff-palooza! Implodes – for now; but is it already too late?

 – by New Deal democrat Let me start this post by picking up where I left off yesterday. In yesterday’s post I suggested that an absolute YoY decline in intermodal rail freight might well show up in this morning’s report from the AAR. And as the below chart shows, that’s exactly what happened, with intermodal traffic […]

The Loss of Starlink Satellites in February 2022

I did a deeper investigation to get to the source of the reported loss on numerous Starlink satellites launched by Elon Musk. As reported on 3 February 2022, SpaceX launched 49 Starlink satellites, 38 of which unexpectedly deorbited. The deorbiting of the satellites was blamed on space weather. A bit of explanation on Space weather: […]

Jobless claims: unresolved post-pandemic seasonality appears once again

 – by New Deal democrat One of the main reasons I include the last two years when I write about initial and continued jobless claims is that a distinct unresolved post-pandemic seasonality has developed. Even after seasonal adjustment, claims have tended to rise in the late spring towards the summer, and then decline beginning in late […]

President Donald Trump opened Memorial Day in the most disgusting way possible

U.S. President Donald Trump opened Memorial Day in the most disgusting way possible, not by praising our fallen heroes but by attacking Democrats. He wrote on his Nazi-infested social media site on Monday morning: Happy Memorial Day to all, including the scum that spent the last four years trying to destroy our country through warped radical left minds . […]

Change in Household Income Resulting from the Republican and Trumps extension of the 2017 Tax Bill or the TCJA

Change in Household Income Resulting from the Republican and Trumps extension of the 2017 Tax Bill or the TCJA Daniel Becker had this bar chart on Facebook which details how the tax break will play out. Really great for the 1 tenth of 1 percenters. Good for the top 1 percenters and the upper five […]

Repeat home sales through March confirm continued deceleration of price increases

 – by New Deal democrat Last week the existing home sales report showed continued deceleration in YoY price increases to 1.8%, indicative of the ongoing rebalancing of the housing market. This morning’s repeat home sales reports from the FHFA and S&P Case Shiller confirmed that deceleration and ongoing rebalancing. On a seasonally adjusted basis, in […]