The Angry Bear

Chewing over the message of online job postings Here’s an interesting graph I came across yesterday. It’s from the Conference Board. What it does is track the number of job postings online, and breaks them down between first postings and repeat postings: Let me say first of all that it is of limited use. The data only goes back to 2005, so there isn’t much history — heck, online job postings didn’t even *exist* until the end of the 1990s! Further,...

Is Strengthening Labor Good for Development? Servaas Storm, who’s always worth reading, has posted on the INET website a summary of a new working paper he coauthored.  This issue goes way back with me—I first started looking into and writing about the labor rights/wage/trade/development nexus back in the 1980s.  Working on my own, I had a lot of false starts, and I’m happy to see others digging much more deeply today. I won’t comment on the substance of...

AG Jeffrey B. Sessions: “I would cite you to the Apostle Paul and his clear and wise command in Romans 13, to obey the laws of the government because God has ordained them for the purpose of order,” he said. “Orderly and lawful processes are good in themselves and protect the weak and lawful.” I would quote back to the hypocrite Sessions. Leviticus 19:33-34: 33 “When a foreigner resides among you in your land, do not mistreat them. 34 The foreigner...

Healthcare Insurers Lose in Court Over Risk Corridor Funds I have written a couple of times about Sessions, Upton, Kingston, and Republicans sabotaging the ACA Risk Corridor Program with the insertion of Section 227 in the CRomnibus Bill signed in December 2014. Not only did Senator Sessions, Representative Upton (MI), and Representative Kingston (CO) block the funding of the Risk Corridor Program; with the insertion of Section 227 by Representative...

Gas- and housing-powered inflation mean real wages are going nowhere This morning consumer price inflation for May was reported at +0.2%. YoY inflation was 2.8%. This is tied for the highest in six years (blue): The cause of the increase was primarily twofold — and neither one reflective of wage inflation. First, gas prices have increased by over 20% in the past year (red, right scale above). Second, the costs for shelter (housing) are picking up...

The Singapore Deal I have refused to forecast what two unpredictable leaders will do, and I shall continue that, other than to say I do not believe North Korea will denuclearize.  Otherwise, well, the written deal was mostly aspirations while there seem to be disagreements about the verbal deals.  DPRK says US has agreed to lift sanctions but US says no.  As it is, at least it happened and there will be more talk, according to the paper agreement. As...

I present myself as an expert here, but may be confused. You should probably stick to Wikipedia. I’m not sure the centifuges in North Korea are all that important. North Korea doesn’t use centrifuges to make bombs. Like almost everyone (all except Pakistan and the thin boy made by the US& UK & dropped on Nagasaki) they use a nuclear reactor to make Plutonium then extract it using ordinary chemical processes. Similarly, the Iranian Arak reactor...

Update: wholesalers’ sales and inventories — it’s all good Another slow start to the data this week, so let’s take a look at relationship I haven’t updated in awhile. Total sales in the economy are broken up into three categories: manufacturers’, wholesalers’, and retailers’. We’ll get retail sales, the biggest component of the three, later this week. But wholesalers’ sales and inventories were released last week, and are a useful coincident...

Backstabbing Over Cow What is it with cows?  I mean their flatulence does add to global warming, but they seem so benign, chewing their cud while producing milk and meat.  Why is it that national leaders get into fits of backstabbing over them, or especially over all that milk they produce? Well, of course, that is it; they produce a lot of it, and a variety of products come from the milk, which sometimes markets do  not want as much of as some of the...