The Angry Bear

 – by New Deal democrat My “Weekly Indicators” post is up at Seeking Alpha. The big decline in long term interest rates this week in the wake of the Fed’s announced “pivot” towards lowering rates created one of the biggest changes in the long leading indicators for several years. Meanwhile most of the coincident indicators continue to speak of a strong economy. The intersection that is going to tell the tale going forward in the next 6...

Open Threads are created for people to have conversations which may not fit in with topical posts . . . a comment which may be off topic. I usually offer up one topic to start a conversation. Many think it is ok to abandon a nation threatened by a global threat in the form of Russia. Or it could be a threatening China, etc. intimidating other countries. J.P. Jefferson sums it up rather well. The absurdity of mixing three distinctively different...

Industrial production remains below late 2022 peak even after end of UAW strike  – by New Deal democrat Industrial production historically has been the King of Coincident Indicators, turning up and down at the onset and end of recessions in the past. But as I wrote last month there are signs that has changed in the past 20+ years since China was admitted to normal trade relationships with the US. Because manufacturing is a much smaller share of...

A warning (for comments I guess). I really like to answer rhetorical questions. The answers are quite long. I can semi remember one. Being clever (as he often is*) Matthew Yglesias asked how and when the Democratic Socialists became bitter adversaries of the Social Democrats, which is odd since both phrases are translations of the same polysyllabic German word. I happened to know the approximate answher (I didn’t recall the exact date which turns...

Real retail sales mildly positive, but still suggest further deceleration in job gains  – by New Deal democrat Before proceeding further, I should mention – and should have mentioned as to jobless claims – that we are in that part of the year where seasonality often wreaks havoc, so outsized gains or losses should be taken with a grain of salt. This is particularly true as to YoY comparisons of retail claims, because last year November and...

My whole life has been centered around mathematics. It was not until much later when I was told I may, might, could have a talent for writing. It did not dawn on me then as my life’s course or desire was to be an engineer of some type. It never happened because of a little downturn in demand for engineers in the seventies. VP of Patents and Trademarks at USG convinced me then to get some type of degree in Business. I had two years of Calculus to back...

Controversial? My Background? XMarine Sergeant E5 served 68-71. Not an 0311. Was made a Sergeant a couple of months into my third year. Excellent shot with M14. Served during the Vietnam years when we were doing most of the fighting. US pulls out and South Vietnam collapses. US assists Afghanistan in fighting. Does most of the fighting and trains their military. Trump plans a pullout and Biden does it. Afghanistan collapses. Russia attacks...

Jobless claims: good news all around  – by New Deal democrat This was one of the best weeks as to jobless claims all year. Initial claims declined -17,000 to 202,000, a tie for the 2nd lowest number in 10 months. The four week average declined -7,750 to 213,250. With the usual one week delay, continuing claims rose 20,000 to 1.876 million: Even more importantly for forecasting purposes, the YoY% changes both for the weekly number and the...

Having lived in Michigan for twenty-seven plus years, we became aware of PFAS in the surrounding water and land towards the later part of the time period. Much of it was due to the closure or abandonment of businesses in and around the area. Some of the lakes nearby were impacted by land runoff from these sites. Warnings were posted about not eating the fish caught from these lakes. Fortunately, our well was not impacted by it. Michigan is number...

In “2022 Overpayment to Medicare Advantage? Somewhere between 22% and 35%,” Angry Bear, we featured Kip Sullivan’s article, “Medicare Advantage is a money grab by big insurers,” Minnesota Reformer. Besides his own words on the topic, he also used data from MA Overpayment Report, Physicians for a National Health Plan report. Joel led me to this article which I am going to tackle again MA Overpayment Report (pnhp.org) in greater detail and brokn...