Tariffs and Monetary Policy: Moral Hazard and Rent Seeking President Trump’s threat to impose tariffs on Mexico over immigration has pushed Federal Reserve Chair Jay Powell to say that if the tariffs lead to economic growth slowing, the Fed will cut interest rates. While the bump may be about to end, this announcement was followed […]
The sources of the next recession While we are waiting for the ISM May manufacturing survey and construction spending data to be released later this morning, both of which will give us important clues to Friday’s jobs report, let me write down some thoughts on the nerdy question I ruminated about this weekend: what is […]
Kenneth Thomas (an AB contributor) was quoted April 7 in the Journal a second time on the general question of how to solve the problem of subsidy bidding wars. Unfortunately it is behind a paywall…but worth pointing to… WSJ.COM Opinion | Pass a Law to Combat Rent-Seeking Congress could invoke the Commerce Clause to limit […]
North Korean Near-Famine Leads To Dead Nuclear Negotiators It has not been officially reported by the North Korean govt, but long running rumors are now being reported by various serious media that Trump’s big pal Kim Jong Un has recently killed the top 5 officials of his govt who set up his failed summit with […]
Trump’s Latest Mexican Tariff Tirade Irks Senator Grassley Senator Grassley rebukes the latest idiocy from the White House: President Trump dropped a trade war bomb on Thursday when he announced his intent to put in place new and harsh tariffs on goods from Mexico until the “illegal Immigration problem is remedied.” And among the many worried, […]
No Fault Auto Insurance On May 30th, the Democratic Governor of Michigan Gretchen Whitmer, signed what was called a bipartisan effort by the Republican controlled legislature and a few of the Democratic members to solve the problems of expensive automotive insurance in Michigan. Due to redlining, other nefarious schemes, and a lack of transparency to […]
It is possible to cause a huge (short term possibly reversed) increase in carbon capture by algae by dumping iron sulfate in the ocean. On the other hand, uh, well, maybe it won’t work and you will just get a few tons of fish (not many tons of carbon containing detritus on the bottom of […]
Khamenei Denounces Rouhani For Negotiating Nuclear Deal This has been reported by Juan Cole. Apparently Supreme Jurisprudent, Ali Khamenei of Iran in a speech to a large number of university students has seriously denounced President Rouhani for having negotiated the JCPOA nuclear agreement with the United States and other powers. During the negotiations Khamenei played […]
by Dale Coberly The bad news is that we have slipped past the day when we could have saved Social Security from ever reporting “short term actuarial insolvency” by raising the payroll tax one tenth of one percent per year (about a dollar per week). This is only sorta bad because it doesn’t really matter […]
A comment about the economy and the 2020 election Recently I’ve seen a bunch of takes to the effect that “the economy is doing great, and therefore it is likely that Donald Trump will be re-elected.” In my opinion that fear is overblown for three important reasons. The first, least noteworthy reason, is that there […]