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

“Rising Productivity in Manufacturing Reduces the Need for Industrial Workers

Such has been going on for decades. Some history on how much of this evolved historically on the planning side. Equipment efficiencies made planning easier and decreased costs. I started to work in industry late seventies and did so until 2020-something. Fresh out of the service in 71, three years to gain a math-driven BA […]

Inequality Researcher David Splinter Really Doesn’t Like (or Understand) Haig-Simons Income

– by Steve Roth Originally posted at Wealth Economics Economists have widely ignored it, even while dubbing it the “preferred” measure of income. “The greatest trick capital-gainsincome ever managed was convincingthe world that it doesn’t exist.”—Carlos Mucha (inventor of the Platinum Coin) This post draws on a far lengthier and more detailed paper — including support for […]

Gunboat diplomacy

The US has a long and sordid history of military extortion. The latest example is Trump’s saber-rattling movement of Navy battle groups off the coast of Venezuela and the extrajudicial assassinations the administration has been conducting off the Venezuelan coast in the name of drug interdiction.* Writing for the Boston Globe, Stephen Kinzer, a senior […]

Good news for a change

In addition to mRNA vaccines and CAR-T cell therapy, semaglutides and tirzepatides offer transformative therapies, in this case for obesity and associated type-2 diabetes. But the drugs aren’t cheap, so access is a problem in the US. “Medicare will cover semaglutide (Wegovy) and tirzepatide (Zepbound) for their weight management indications for people with obesity, President […]

Republicans say VA patients can get equivalent private-sector care anywhere in the U.S.

Here’s a 50-state reality check of whether that is true or not as discussed by Veterans Healthcare Advocate Suzanne Gordon The Illusion of Choice Republicans say that VA patients can get equivalent private-sector care anywhere in the U.S. Here’s a 50-state reality check. At his confirmation hearing in January of 2025, Secretary of Veterans Affairs Doug Collins, […]

Tabulated initial and continuing state unemployment claims continue rangebound

 – by New Deal democrat As I have done since the beginning of the government shutdown, the number of initial and continuing claims can be calculated notwithstanding, because it is based on reporting by the States, plus DC, Puerto Rico, and the Virgin Islands. Then by applying the same adjustment as was used for the […]

Veteran’s Administration has Lost Thousands of ‘Core’ Medical Staff under Trump

This piece is over two months old. It still has relevance to the current issue of an understaffed VA and still pertinent. The issues with the VA have been ongoing for years. It is not something new. However, the situation has worsened under the Tru_p administration as they have taken a more aggressive role to […]

It’s Medicare hunting season

Probably the best analogy is duck hunting, where they use decoys to fool the ducks. “If the past is any indication, sellers working for insurance companies, some with household names, others not, will snare new recruits into Medicare Advantage plans, possibly omitting in their sales pitches that they will be locked into an MA plan […]

ISM manufacturing confirms regional Feds’ reports: prices up, production improves slightly, employment contracting

 – by New Deal democrat The ISM manufacturing and services reports assume heightened importance this month in view of the continuing federal government shutdown. These two, along with the regional Feds’ manufacturing and services reports, are our best sketch of the economy until the more thorough federal reports resume (hopefully?) We already have the regional Feds’ […]