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

Scenes from the December jobs report: leading jobs sectors and wages

Scenes from the December jobs report: leading jobs sectors and wages Let’s take a more detailed look at last Friday’s December jobs report. First, as usual for the past few months, let’s look at the more leading jobs sectors. This month, let’s also take a more detailed look at wage growth and why it may […]

Scenes from the December jobs report: leading jobs sectors and wages

Scenes from the December jobs report: leading jobs sectors and wages Let’s take a more detailed look at last Friday’s December jobs report. First, as usual for the past few months, let’s look at the more leading jobs sectors. This month, let’s also take a more detailed look at wage growth and why it may […]

Weekly Indicators for January 6 – 10 at Seeking Alpha

 by New Deal democrat Weekly Indicators for January 6 – 10 at Seeking Alpha My Weekly Indicators post is up at Seeking Alpha. How week – or not – the next six months are going to be remains the primary issue. As usual, clicking over and reading should bring you right up to date, as well […]

Small Town Support for Trump and “The Working Class”

Small Town Support for Trump and “The Working Class” Much has been written about voters, sometimes labeled the “white working class”, who live in small towns, have low incomes and supported Trump in 2016.  There are various hypotheses—not, despite the rhetoric, mutually exclusive—that have been proposed to explain this: never-ending latent racism galvanized by the […]

Are We Living In The “Capitalocene”?

Are We Living In The “Capitalocene”? I also attended the last session listed in the program at the ASSA at 2:30 on Sunday, an URPE session on “Ecology, the Environment, and Energy,” chaired by Paul Cooney.  He presented on “Marxism and Ecological Economics: An Assessment of the Past, Present, and Future.” Lynne Chester presented on […]

January’s reports start out with a decidedly mixed picture for 2020

January’s reports start out with a decidedly mixed picture for 2020 We have our first bits of forward-looking data for the year: November residential construction, December ISM manufacturing, and December light vehicle sales. They paint a decidedly mixed picture. Let’s take a look in order. Residential construction spending improved by a strong 1.9% in November. […]

Weekly Indicators for December 30 – January 3 at Seeking Alpha

by New Deal democrat Weekly Indicators for December 30 – January 3 at Seeking Alpha  My Weekly Indicators post is up at Seeking Alpha. There were marginal moves to the downside on both the producer and consumer sides of the ledger this past week. As usual, clicking over and reading rewards me with just a little […]

Long Bond Yields vs The Long Wave

Different  bloggers  have been posting their favorite charts of 2019 this January.  So I decided to post my favorite chart of the past 20, or more, “years of the long bond yield versus the long run trend.”  Bond yields are now below their long run trend and may be at or near a secular bottom.  […]

Is The Chinese Economic System the “Mandarin Growth Model” or the “Chinese-Style Keiretsu System”?

Is The Chinese Economic System the “Mandarin Growth Model” or the “Chinese-Style Keiretsu System”? The first term in this choice was the title of a paper presented this morning (1/4/20) at the ACES/ASSA session at 8 AM in San Diego by Wei Xiong of Princeton University.  It was a highly mathematical model I shall describe […]