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

The art of the fake deal

The latest meme around the Trump tariffs is TACO: Trump Always Chickens Out. Savvy traders are buying on the TACO tariff dips and selling on the TACO caves. And those caves are popular. “Yesterday, the Conference Board reported that in May consumer confidence surged by 12.3, the largest monthly increase in four years. Bloomberg said […]

Trump hates local government

I recall a time when the Republican Party stood for small government and local control. The grandiose Trump GOP cult has abandoned that principle in favor of meddling in anything and everything public and private that Trump opposes. “The administration has threatened to hold back the funds and permissions unless New York stops charging tolls […]

Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain

Trump says he’s using tariffs to re-shore manufacturing from other countries. Setting aside the fact that it takes years to build and operationalize a manufacturing plant, why would anyone bother when he flip-flops every week? This has nothing to do with jobs in America. This is pure market manipulation for speculators. “Donald Trump has announced […]

What you need to share about the “one big beautiful” ugly horrible bill

I subscribe to Robert Reich’s site also. The old economist as he calls himself asks that subscribers publish this particular commentary of Roberts, He is attempting to publish more information above Trumps tax cut bill. I can vouch for question 1 as I posted on how a cut in Medicare could happen. Robert is claiming […]

Trump’s flim-flam pharmaceuticals plan

Trump announced that he’ll sign an executive order today that will lower drug costs in the US. ““I will be instituting a MOST FAVORED NATION’S POLICY whereby the United States will pay the same price as the Nation that pays the lowest price anywhere in the World,” the president posted Sunday on his social media […]

Trump just raised taxes

As everyone should know, tariffs are just consumption taxes. Other countries don’t pay them. Importers don’t pay them. The extra cost is just added to the retail price. “As of 12:01 am ET on Saturday, most auto part imports will come with a 25% import tax. “The previous auto tariffs left US-made cars untouched. Not […]

State Contributions to Federal Revenue

“Which states contribute the most and least to federal revenue?” USAFacts All states—and their taxpayers—send money to federal coffers. The government distributes much of this back to states, but some receive more money than they contributed. This shapes how money flows through Social Security, Medicaid, and infrastructure projects nationwide.   Source: IRS, USASpending.gov – Get the data – […]

The economics of national security

I see where Trump has tweeted on his Twitter knock-off Pravda Social that the number of foreign-made films imported to the US is a “national security threat.” He wants to use this as an excuse to impose a 100% tariff on foreign flicks. This elasticity in the definition of “national security” could be made to […]

So much for “just in time”

The “just in time” model is supposed to make supply chains more efficient by minimizing warehousing and storage. The current Trump tariffs are doing violence to the JIT model: “Trade experts say that companies have stockpiled enough inventory in recent months that, if the White House reverses course soon and significantly drops tariffs on China, […]