Commentary Economic slowdown but no recession! That message comes from the latest employment report, service sector data, and Federal Reserve. “We’re not in a recession right now. We do have these two-quarters of negative GDP growth. To some extent, a recession is in the eyes of the beholder. With all the job growth in the…
July Jobs Upside Blowout Signals More Rate Hikes
NEW YORK—July jobs printed at a blowout 528,000 jobs, more than double the consensus estimate of 250,000 jobs. The unemployment rate was 3.5 percent, down 0.1 percentage point from last month, and also down from last July’s 5.4 percent. The labor force participation rate was 62.1 percent, up from the 61.7 percent that printed in July…
Mayberry RED: Putting Savings Above Security
Commentary One of the most side-splitting scenes in the history of cinema is Stanley Kubrick’s depiction of General Jack. D. Ripper telling Peter Sellers’s British RAF Group Captain Mandrake about the dangers of fluoridated water in the film “Doctor Strangelove.” Ripper, played totally straight-faced by Sterling Hayden, asks, “Do you realize that in addition to…
Build Back Better Lowered Living Standards, So Let’s Do It Again!
August 5, 2022
admin
Build Back BetterBusiness & MarketsBusiness ColumnistseconomyinflationMarketsOpinionrecessionstandard of livingUSUS NewsViewpoints
0 Comment
Commentary A businessman once asked a famous labor leader what he wanted for his workers. The leader replied, “More.” Those favoring policies to increase government spending and control over the economy have the same answer, but add the word power. A problem occurs when a company can’t afford more and the demand leads to bankruptcy….
Education Is in Shambles
August 5, 2022
admin
AnalysisBusiness & MarketsBusiness ColumnistseducationHomeschoolinglockdownsmandatesmandatory maskingOpinionpublic schoolsschool closuressocial distancing
0 Comment
Commentary The single most bizarre aspect of the pandemic policy response was the shutting of schools, public and private. One country never did that—Sweden—and the results were fabulous: zero deaths and zero educational losses. That this was the right choice should have been obvious from the beginning. COVID was never a serious threat to kids,…
The ‘Social’ in ‘ESG’ Investing Means Whatever Issuers Want It to Mean
August 5, 2022
admin
Business & MarketsBusiness Columnistseconomic policiesESGinvestingInvestmentSocialSocial IssuesUncategorized
0 Comment
Commentary This is the second installment of a three-part commentary on ESG investing. The first installment, “The USA Should Clarify the ‘E’ in ‘ESG’ and Use Carbon Standards to Our Advantage,” was published on May 25. SOURCE: “Through the Looking Glass” by Lewis Carroll. (Wikimedia Commons, public domain.) After that statement in the illustration, Lewis Carroll…
Death of the First-Time Homebuyer
August 4, 2022
admin
Business & MarketsBusiness Columnistsfirst time homebuyerhome pricesOpinionreal estateUSUS Real EstateViewpoints
0 Comment
You might have learned that supply and demand dictates price before you graduated high school. There’s a less-discussed variable within—the capacity to pay. Say that you and I are crawling through the hot desert, penniless and dying of thirst. We have a high demand for a drink of water. Next, we’re lucky enough to find…
After More Than a Year of Supply Issues, Demand Woes Have Taken Center Stage
August 4, 2022
admin
Business & MarketsBusiness ColumnistseconomyinflationMarketsOpinionrecessionsupply and demandUSViewpoints
0 Comment
Commentary For more than a year now, the major economic story hasn’t been inflation but rather supply. This was primarily due to governments around the world overreacting to the pandemic, so businesses the world over found it exceedingly difficult to respond to recovering (sometimes boosted) economies. In very basic economics (small “e”), such inelasticity on…
How to Mangle Money
August 4, 2022
admin
Business & MarketsBusiness ColumnistseconomyFederal ReserveMarketsOpinionquantitive easingViewpoints
0 Comment
Commentary In my last column, I explained how both governments and banks create money. The basics are incredibly simple—so simple, in fact, that the great non-mainstream economist John Kenneth Galbraith once commented that: “The process by which banks create money is so simple that the mind is repelled. Where something so important is involved, a…
The Commotion About Carried Interest Tax
Commentary A government spending deal formulated by Senate Democrats could finally lead to increasing the tax rate on so-called carried interest income. It’s a capital gains tax applied to an arcane concept—irrelevant to 99 percent of taxpayers—that has been debated in the halls of Congress for more than a decade. Taxing carried interest at the…
-
Recent Posts
-
Archives
- May 2025
- April 2025
- July 2023
- June 2023
- May 2023
- April 2023
- March 2023
- February 2023
- January 2023
- December 2022
- November 2022
- October 2022
- September 2022
- August 2022
- July 2022
- June 2022
- May 2022
- April 2022
- March 2022
- February 2022
- January 2022
- December 2021
- November 2021
- October 2021
- September 2021
- August 2021
- July 2021
- June 2021
- May 2021
- April 2021
- March 2021
- February 2021
- January 2021
- December 2020
- September 2013
- July 2013
- March 2013
- January 2013
- December 2012
- November 2012
- December 1
-
Meta