The Angry Bear

The American Right Schmoozes Hungary’s Orban  Fox News’s biggest star, Tucker Carlson, is broadcasting this week from Budapest where a political festival is happening under the aegis of Hungarian leader, Victor Orban.  As observers have noted, Orban has engaged in a gradual process of turning Hungary from a functioning EU democracy into an authoritarian state that maintains a veneer of democracy. Crucial to this is control over most of the media...

Initial jobless claims continue in range, while continuing claims sharply decline Initial jobless claims declined another 14,000 this week to 385,000, still 17,000 above their best pandemic levels of 368,000 set on June 26 and July 10. The 4 week average of claims declined by 250 to 394,000, also 9,500 above its pandemic low set on July 11: Significant progress in the decline of initial claims remains stalled, as it has for the last 2...

[unable to retrieve full-text content]What Does Vaccine Effectiveness Mean? by Peter Dorman  When technical specialists adopt an everyday word, they often give it a meaning that differs from its everyday use.  This can be misleading for nonspecialists, especially when little effort is made to explain the difference.  A well-known example is “significance”, which means one thing when used in […] The post What Does Vaccine Effectiveness Mean? appeared first on...

[unable to retrieve full-text content]June personal income and spending show pandemic cushion approaching depletion How well personal income and spending held up throughout the pandemic is one of the best things about the government response. For June, nominal personal income increased 0.1%. After inflation, however, it decreased -0.4%. Nominal personal spending increased 1.0%. After inflation, it still increased 0.5%. […] The post June personal income and spending show pandemic...

An assortment of informational articles arriving at my in-box which I have reviewed and found to be interesting. Quite a bit of healthcare this time which I believe can be accessed by readers at Angry Bear. Tennessee won’t incentivize Covid shots — but pays to vax cows – POLITICO, August 2021 NASHVILLE, Tenn. — Tennessee has sent nearly half a million dollars to farmers who have vaccinated their cattle against respiratory diseases and other...

EconoSpeak: Socially Ambivalent Labour Time VII: Capital volume 1, chapters one and three. Sandwichman, July 30, 2021 Afterword to the Second German Edition [of Das Kapital, Buch 1] (1873): I must start by informing the readers of the first edition about the alterations made in the second edition. One is struck at once by the clearer arrangement of the book. Additional notes are everywhere marked as notes to the second edition. The following...

 by New Deal democrat Weekly Indicators for July 26 – 30 at Seeking Alpha My Weekly Indicators post is up at Seeking Alpha. Ironically, as the bond market smells weakness ahead, driving long term rates down, it also sets up a rebound from that weakness further out. In the meantime, Q2 corporate profits are through the roof. As usual, clicking over and reading should bring you up to the virtual moment, and bring me some change for a...

Manufacturing sector continues to be on fire; but real construction spending plunges August data started out mixed.  The ISM manufacturing index continued to show strong expansion. Both the overall and new orders components declined slightly m/m, but at 59.5 and 64.9 remained far about the breakeven point between expansion and contractions of 50.0: The simplest way to read this is that the manufacturing sector remains on fire. The...

This is a picture of the beaver pond behind my old family home in western Massachusetts: You can’t tell from the picture, but the pond is at least a mile long and 1/4 mile wide, I think considerably bigger.  The land under the pond had been farmed and then forested before being flooded by beavers.  We know the land was farmed because there are stone walls that run into it, and we know it was reforested because when we first bought the land in the...

The American Rescue Plan included a fully refundable child tax credit.  The credit provides $3,600 per year for children under 6, and $3,000 per year for children between 6 and 17. The credit is paid out monthly, and slowly phases out for single parents who earn more than $112,500 and married couples earning more than $150,000. This legislation marks a sea change in government policy towards poor children.  For years, the poorest children have...