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

Ambivalence

by Tom Walker Econospeak Book proposal: Marx’s Fetters and the Realm of Freedom: a remedial reading — part 2.2 Published in 1821, The Source and Remedy of the National Difficulties was a major influence on Marx’s analysis of ‘disposable time.’ In an 1851 notebook, Marx logged a 1000 word summary of the pamphlet. He also discussed it […]

Are Drug Companies Alone Responsible for the Prices We Pay for Medicines?

I had presented Part I and Part II a while back. Part III was difficult to present in a piece-meal way so for now I have set it aside. What is interesting about Part IV is I can beak it apart into segments, still maintain the flow of informatio, and present it in a logical […]

A Partial Presentation- Joe Biden’s Legacy

Biden’s legacy: a Summary by Noah Smith – an introduction to Noahpinion Noahpinion Joe Biden announced today that he won’t seek reelection for President. We don’t yet know who will replace him, but we know Biden’s tenure in office will soon end. Now is the perfect time to talk about Biden’s legacy as America’s 46th […]

Inversion

by Tom Walker Econospeak Book proposal: Marx’s Fetters and the Realm of Freedom: a remedial reading — part 2.3  Inversion Marx stated repeatedly in the Grundrisse that capital inverts the relationship between necessary and superfluous labour time. Capital both creates disposable time and expropriates it in the form of surplus value, reversing the nature-imposed priority of necessity […]

Are Real Interest Rates Restrictive?

 – by New Deal democrat Over the weekend Harvard econ professor Jason Furman suggested that the Fed funds rate is not very restrictive: “As inflation has come down the real Federal funds rate has risen and is now the most restrictive it has been this cycle, a point that Austin Goolsbee has emphasized a number of times […]

Arguments from evidence

Kevin Drum pushes back on the WSJ claim that household debt is a problem in America, and Kevin brings the receipts: “. . . debt as a percent of disposable income . . . is currently lower than it was at the end of 2019 (9.8% vs. 10%). “. . . household debt as a […]

Why Consumption Taxes (VATs) are Insanely Regressive

Progressives and social democrats should be fighting them tooth and nail, not blithely embracing them. by Steve Roth Originally Posted at Wealth Economics The spreadsheet behind the tables and graphs here is available on request. Drop me a line in the comments or elsewhere. Following the community of Socks (🧦s) or “social democrats” out there […]

Months’ Supply of Multi-Family Housing under Construction Decreasing. What is the cure?

Building Badly Needed Muti-Family Housing What is holding back more building of badly needed muti-family housing is the Fed Rate. The effort of course is to bring down inflation. As you read, I think you will discover the effort by the Fed is not achieving the goal it wishes to achieve. Indeed, its efforts to […]