Anthony Kennedy will retire July 31. This gives Trump and Republican Senators a chance to nominate and confirm a fifth hard right justice. Already the Court has become extremely ideological and activist. Today it declared that Unions couldn’t require employers to pay the union a a fixed amount per worker, because that allegedly violated the […]
“I have rarely seen so much inconsistency and even hypocrisy from the Supreme Court as in its decision to uphold President Trump’s travel ban.” On the Colorado SCOTUS Decision A few weeks ago, the court found that members of the Colorado Civil Rights Commission had expressed impermissible hostility to religion because of relatively mild statements […]
(Dan here….lifted from comments, lightly edited for readability) by Dale Coberly I’ll offer my own answer to the question. (of Morality in Capitalism post here) “Capitalism” offers itself as the answer to morality. always in some version of the Ayn Randian “life is time and time is money so taxes are not only theft, they […]
(Dan here…re posted from March 7, Angry Bear) by run 75441 There are no loud guns shots in the middle of the night. No screams for help or sounds of cars speeding away. No police sirens or flashing lights. It is pretty quiet when someone ODs on Opioids unless someone finds them before it is […]
I almost always agree with Kevin Drum who is, among other things, a brilliant economist even thoug (or largely because) he didn’t study economics much in college. But I don’t entirely agree with his one minute explanation of the importance of the yield curve for macroeconomic forecasting. the ever-fascinating yield curve, which tracks the difference […]
(Dan here…From Esquire comes this note from the Boston Globe): We begin with good news up here in the Commonwealth (God save it!), where Attorney General Maura Healey, who does not punch down, has opened hostilities against the pharmaceutical companies that have raked in the profits from the opioid crisis. From The Boston Globe: She asserts that the […]
by Peter Turchin What Is the Role of Morality in a Capitalist Economy? published at Evonomics is worth a visit…it is academic but can offer material for discussion, involving several economists. I am not going to try to summarize.
The ACLU’s Ría Tabacco Mar reviewed a recent SCOTUS decision in the NYT. South Dakota is being allowed to murder a man rather than commit him to a life time of hell in a natural life sentence . Charles Rhines was convicted of murdering a man while robbing a Dunkin Donut store he used to […]
Gimme shelter update: housing purchase affordability Let’s update one measure of housing prices: comparing of the purchasing power of buyers vs. the price a typical house. There are at least 3 indexes. First, here is the N.A.R.’s “Housing affordability index,” updated through May. This compares their estimate of median household income vs. the median price […]