Gas prices sound a consumer warning I got a note yesterday from a fellow forecaster pointing out that crude oil prices have once again made new 7 year highs. This is something I also highlighted in my “Weekly Indicators” column on Saturday. As I write this on Wednesday morning, West Texas Intermediate Crude trades at […]
I find myself disagreeing completely with Ezra Klein. This is very unusual and I feel compelled to blog about it (note you should not feel at all compelled to read this post which is self therapy). I am commenting on a twitter thread here. I am going to cut and paste a lot (because I […]
Coronavirus Dashboard for February 8: Omicron declines sharply; did Delta provide protection against the worst outcomes? As I mentioned yesterday, I haven’t posted a Coronavirus dashboard in awhile, and with Omicron in rapid retreat, it’s time for an update. To begin with, deaths are presently peaking at roughly 2450 a day, while nationwide cases are […]
Noah Smith (and many others) is irritated by a puff piece about Stephanie Kelton and modern monetery theory MMT by Jeanna Smialak in the New York Times. I am not interested in Smialak’s article. I think that Noah sums up his critique here very well “The article then demonstrates that it has little notion of […]
Student Loan Cancellation will not Benefit the Wealthy, Alan Collinge, Student Loan Justice Org. Alan Collinge History In 1972, allegations about students abusing bankruptcy3 courts were beginning to make headlines. Major newspapers were publishing anecdotes about students who took out large college loans. Supposedly then, young graduates or students quickly declared bankruptcy to avoid paying them off. The […]
Public opinion in many countries is shifting against COVID-19 precautions and restrictions – even against vaccine requirements. This has some libertarians declaring victory. Not only are they declaring victory, they are claiming that the rollback of restrictions shows that they were right all along, and that the restrictions were foisted on us by a corrupt […]
Can Ukraine Become A New Austria? In this Sunday’s Washington Post, columnist David von Drehle suggests that a way out of the difficult Russia/Ukraine situation would be for Ukraine to become like what happened with Austria in 1955 and since; it formally became officially neutral, not joining either NATO or the Warsaw Pact, and has […]
Latest school book banning in certain areas of the country as presented by The Atlantic. Black Boy by Richard Wright, The Freedom Writers Diary by Erin Gruwell, Kurt Vonnegut’s Slaughterhouse Five as challenged by the Livingston (county. Michigan) Organization for Values in Education where I used to live. Catcher in The Rye did not make it on the […]
This is one of the times when I missed the BLS annual adjustment also. RJS was right on the money this morning in reporting it. A portion of the 467,000 was due to adjustments in December and January data. RJS, MarketWatch 666, Employers Add 467,000 Jobs in January, Unemployment Rate Rises to 4.0% The Employment Situation […]