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

The Revolutionary Class

by Tom Walker Econospeak Book proposal: Marx’s Fetters and the Realm of Freedom: a remedial reading — part 2.7 The revolutionary class “The working class is either revolutionary or it is nothing,” Marx wrote to German politician J.B. von Schweitzer and copied “word for word” in a letter to Engels. In The Manifesto of the Communist […]

ISM weighted mfg.+ non-mfg. indexes warrant hoisting a yellow caution flag for the economy

 – by New Deal democrat I’ll spare you the introductory graphs this month, but let me reiterate my opening comments from last month: I never used to pay much attention to the ISM non-manufacturing report. That is partly because it only has a 20 year history, and partly because it seems to be more coincident […]

Pediatrics in America Part 2: Pediatric hospitals are disappearing

In a previous post, I called attention to the decline in the number of medical students who choose pediatrics as a career. Some of the slack can be taken up by nurses and physician assistants, but access to pediatricians is a growing problem. So, too, is access to pediatric care at hospitals: “Pediatric hospitals have […]

Jobless claims appear to show both signal and post-pandemic seasonality noise

 – by New Deal democrat Since tomorrow is the Big Holiday, initial and continuing claims were reported today. [Also, on a programming note, later this morning I will also post about the ISM non-manufacturing survey once it is published, since it now plays an increased role in my forecasting]. Initial claims rose 4,000 last week to […]

Biden’s Crappy Economy . . .

JOLTS report shows stabilization in almost all metrics for May  – by New Deal democrat The JOLTS report for May showed most metrics continued to show a slight rebounding from their March lows. The overall picture for now appears to be one of stabilization, consistent with the fabled “soft landing.” To the data: job openings (blue […]

Pediatrics in America Part 1: Need a pediatrician?

If you want to make the big bux as a physician, you need to do procedures (e.g., endoscopies, colonoscopies, surgery). Among the most poorly compensated branches of medicine are pediatrics and geriatrics. And yet: “Pediatricians attend the same medical schools as those who enter other specialties, and education is expensive. Almost half of those who […]

June manufacturing rebounds, May construction spending declines to (only) slightly negative

 – by New Deal democrat As usual, the month starts out with important data on manufacturing and construction. There was bad news and good news. The bad news is that both were negative. The relatively good news is that they were so slightly negative as to be essentially flat. First, the ISM report on manufacturing […]

A nation is really rich if the working day is 6 hours rather than twelve

Book proposal: Marx’s Fetters and the Realm of Freedom: a remedial reading — part 2.8 by Tom Walker Econospeak In “The Trinity Formula,” in chapter 48 of volume 3 of Capital, Marx returned to the contradiction between the forces and relations of production. This time, however, it was not to deplore or analyze the fetters but […]

Where Does Wealth Really “Come From”?

Short answer: Lending, government deficits, capital formation, and holding gains by Steve Roth Originally Published at Wealth Economics I ended my last post with an apparent conundrum: “One person’s spending is another person’s income.” It seems to imply that spending and income must be equal. And since saving equals income minus spending, saving must be…zero? That’s obviously […]