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

Is Age Really a Factor or Is It Just Political Maneuvering

SUMMARY: The 2024 presidential election has turned into a crash course in gerontology. On Election Day, former president Donald Trump will be 78 years old, and President Biden will be a couple weeks shy of 82. Never have two people of such advanced age been the nominees of the major political parties, nor has there […]

Anatomy of a policy failure

by Merrill Goozner GoozNews How high-deductible health insurance plans, touted by free marketeers, caused the medical debt crisis and degraded public health. ~~~~~~~~ The 2003 Medicare Modernization Act, best known for its senior citizen drug plans, also encouraged the rapid expansion of high-deductible health plans (HDHPs). It allowed people, mostly well-off, to put pre-tax earnings […]

Abortion, IVF and the nanny state

Let’s be very clear: in vitro fertilization (IVF) results in far more zygotes than will ever be implanted. Further, pre-implantation testing means that some zygotes will be rejected. In the end, this means that millions of fertilized eggs will be discarded. That was always baked in the IVF cake. For reasons that escape me as […]

Questioning the University Investments Feeding the Endowments. The Returns are Weak

Excellent piece by one of CEPR’s Domestic Program Interns . . . Alex Richwine. That name rings a bell with me. I am sure you will find this piece to be an excellent report detailing university investment returns. Quite apropos . . . give todays circumstances. ~~~~~~~~ University Endowment Returns Don’t Measure Up by Alex […]

New Deal democrat Weekly Indicators May 20-24, 2024

 – by New Deal democrat My “Weekly Indicators” post is up at Seeking Alpha. While the inverted yield curve and negative money supply growth keep the long leading indicators negative, both the short leading and coincident indicators have almost all turned neutral or positive. As usual, clicking over and reading will bring you up to the […]

IEA Global Electricity Statistical Analysis February 2024

The IEA report covers a February-to-February timeframe 2023 – 2024. When the IEA speaks of evolution, they are reviewing the OECD usage and direction for 13 months. There is a brief summation in the beginning for Fossil Fuel. Renewable Sources, and Nuclear power production. The charts tell the rest of the story for the OECD […]

Decisive Rejection of an Economic Orthodoxy Dominating American Policy for nearly Half a Century

Nice Evening Read. I am not a big believer in tariffs. However, as it is today and from the seventies, domestic companies have relocated to countries to escape avoid associated Labor and Domestic costs prevalent in the United States. Cost such as healthcare, OT, work conditions, Workman’s Comp, SS, etc. and there are issues such […]

Real disposable personal income per capita is also hoisting a yellow caution flag

 – by New Deal democrat To reiterate my Big Picture theme for this year, now that the supply chain tailwind has ended, will the effects of the 2022-23 Fed rate hikes drag the economy down towards recession at last, or will there be a “soft landing” (or no landing at all) instead, because interest rates […]

Ethics at SCOTUS? No one will challenge the run-amuck Justices Any Time Soon

I decided to take a break from the recital of numbers on the economy, energy, or population and look elsewhere for something to feature. I spent some time at Slate’s The Best of the Fray. It was heavily populated with people who could really discuss the issues and the law. Not so numbers oriented like […]

New home sales: all of the shoes have dropped except one . . .

Angry Bear is fortunate to have amongst its stable of writers, New Deal democrat. I can always count on his having a commentary on a daily basis. If you have not been following his reports on the economy, you should be. A double header today. New home sales: all of the shoes have dropped except […]