Late and brief thoughts on Trump’s assault on the independence of the Fed. It’s old news.now, but one way in which Trump assaulted norms, shocked investors, then flinched when asset prices moved was his discussion of firing the chairman of the Federal Reserve Board. To orthodox macroeconomists and also me this is an extreme heresy. […]
“Behind closed doors, some Republicans are irked that their leaders are not doing enough explaining: One Republican with direct knowledge of the matter told POLITICO “there’s frustration for not laying out the rationale behind Medicaid cuts.” Not to worry. Here’s Duncan Black: “ . . . the rich want more money and they want you […]
Look, tariffs are just consumption taxes. American consumers pay for tariffs on Chinese goods, not the Chinese government, businesses or people. Trump pretends that exporting countries pay our tariffs. If he really believed that, he’d be happy to see Amazon post how much China is paying to get their goods into our market. But when […]
– by New Deal democrat Last week I noted that the deceleration in YoY prices in the existing home sales report was indicative of the ongoing rebalancing of the housing market, and I would be looking for confirmation in the repeat home sales reports this week. This morning, we got it. On a seasonally adjusted […]
Robert Reich askes where are our past presidents and vice president? When it comes to the necessity of speaking out against this dangerous and detestable regime, where are Bill Clinton and George W. Bush, and where are their vice presidents, Al Gore and Dick Cheney? Well, one did show up in San Francisco for Climate […]
Yesterday (28th) I introduced the 1st half of Charles Gaba commentary. In case you forgot what it was, you can find it here: Twenty-one Million Americans to Lose Healthcare – Angry Bear for reread. Charles does a thorough job of discussing what Repubs are planning to do to a sizeable number of citizens. To the […]
– by New Deal democrat This month the economic surveys by the five regional Feds which conduct them – New York, Philly, Richmond, Kansas City, and Dallas – have assumed additional importance as among the likely first warnings of impacts from T—-p’s trade wars. This morning the last manufacturing survey for the month, from Dallas, was […]
I will simplify this to a manner in which I have worked in for almost 50 years. The big issues around manufacturing are the Infrastructure (bldg., machinery, etc.), Overhead, and Labor. All of which is a part of the cost of manufacturing. Typically, you will find the infrastructure to be a onetime price. Overhead has […]
– by New Deal democrat Covd-19 has now been with us for over five years. The first reliable statistics started to be kept at the end of March 2020. On Friday the CDC issued the final update for deaths ending the week of March 29, 2025, which means we now have five full years of documentation. […]
Apparently, MAGA means empty shelves and fewer jobs: “Trump’s tariffs on goods from China have disrupted trans-Pacific supply chains. U.S. officials are alarmed by companies’ dwindling inventories of critical raw-earth metals necessary for a range of economic activity; Beijing restricted the metals this month. In the three weeks since the tariffs took effect, ocean-container bookings […]