The Angry Bear

In Defense of the Francois-Baughman Analysis of the Trump Tariffs Dr. Joseph Francois and Laura M. Baughman are being criticized for writing: This policy brief examines the potential net impacts on U.S. jobs across all industries of the proposed steel and aluminum tariffs applied to targeted steel and aluminum imports from all countries. It does not take into account any potential retaliation against U.S. exports; only of the tariffs themselves. We find...

pgl responded to the post below… “Corporations… make profits appear in low-tax countries; but there’s very little real production or employment behind those profits…. Tax-haven countries… show… ridiculously high levels of profits relative to wages… because the profits aren’t being earned where they’re being reported…. Ireland….” Krugman is referring to transfer pricing manipulation. One would have hoped tax reform would make enforcing the arm’s length...

June jobs report: another strong late cycle reading HEADLINES: +213,000 jobs added U3 unemployment rate up +0.2% from 3.8% to 4.0% U6 underemployment rate up +0.2% from 7.6% to 7.8% Here are the headlines on wages and the broader measures of underemployment: Wages and participation rates Not in Labor Force, but Want a Job Now:  up +75,000 from 5.183 million to 5.258 million Part time for economic reasons: down -205,000 from 4.948 million to 4.743...

(Dan here…Lifted from Robert’s Stochastic Thoughts) by Robert Waldmann Kung Fu Monkey Nobel Prize I just learned that Quinnipiak U polled asking people whether Donald Trump deserved a Nobel Prize for his Singapore summit. I honestly thought that this was a great opportunity for Kung Fu Monkey to score again. Kung Fu Monkey is a blog where a dialogue was posted in which one of the bloggers confidently asserts that 27% of US adults are insane reactionaries....

(Dan here…late posting) by New Deal democrat On July 4, a consideration of Dred Scot On a 4th of July on which the President has expressed open longing for a lifetime term, and murmurings that a significant share of enlisted men in the military would be willing to overturn the Constitutional order should he call on them to do so, I’m not too interested in empty sloganeering celebrations. With the obvious exception of African slaves, the Constitution was...

Pruitt’s EPA Trashing Benefit-Cost Analysis Of Environmental Policy Scott Pruitt increasingly looks the worst of the worst out of the appalling cabinet of President Trump, quite aside from his race to become the single most corrupt cabinet member in the entire history ofthe US.  The latter is trivial compared to his policy change after policy change that will increase pollution in the environment and end up killing people, to be blunt about it.  But now...

David Gelles interviewed Richard and Holly Branson for The New York Times Saturday David Gelles (NYT): What do you think those in positions of power should do to address social problems like income inequality? Richard Branson: A basic income should be introduced in Europe and in America. It’s great to see countries like Finland experimenting with it in certain cities. It’s a disgrace to see people sleeping on the streets with this material wealth all...

Shock EU Court Decision Strikes Blow Against Investment Arbitration With all the dreary news we’ve seen this week, could you stand some good news? The battle against investor-state dispute settlement (ISDS) got a huge boost in March when the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) ruled in Slovak Republic v. Achmea B.V. (“Achmea”) that ISDS is contrary to EU law. The decision was something of a surprise because the preliminary analysis (“opinion,”...

Great new Tax Justice Network podcast on how “Bean Counters…Broke Capitalism” The June 28 Taxcast is out with a focus on the Big Four accounting firms. Richard Brooks is the author of Bean Counters: The triumph of the accountants and how they broke capitalism (order here in the UK and here in the US) which documents accountants’ involvement in some of the world’s worst financial scandals, not least of which is the promotion of tax havens. The new...