The Angry Bear

Scott Alexander at Slate Star Codex has a very good post on cost disease. It definitely betrays a strong libertarian or conservative bias, but is nevertheless, worth reading. The piece that resonates with me is posted below. It has some good insights, one or two that are questionable (for anyone not firmly ensconced on the right), but overall it methodically works its way to one hell of a punch-in-the-gut truth in last sentence. Imagine if tomorrow, the price...

by Barkley Rosser  (originally published at Econospeak) Trump And The Fed It may be way too soon to say anything sensible about what Trump thinks about the Fed or will do  about it, but as the first person to have publicly called for appointing Janet Yellen as Chair (back in 2009), I figure I am more situated to stick my neck out to say something, especially when it looks like what is coming is a big contradictory mess.For the moment the Fed seems to be...

by New Deal democrat A thought for Sunday: No, Trump isn’t imploding — but the opposition is broad and intense My post from two weeks ago, “No, Trump isn’t Imploding” got picked up by a few other sites within the past few days, and I wanted to follow up because we have a fuller picture of public opinion now. Basically, Trump still isn’t imploding. He is holding his base. In fact, there is a little economic evidence that they are putting their wallets where...

We’ve gotten to another point where it’s hard for me to turn on the TV. I know this will have to change, but for now I’ll go back to one of my favorite topics, the fate of Ireland under austerity. As I suggested might happen, Ireland in its 2015-2016 immigration statistical year (May-April) was finally able to end its net emigration. According to the Central Statistical Office’s August report, 3100 more people came to Ireland than left during 2015-2016. This...

by Barkley Rosser                (originally published at Econospeak) The Scale Of Trump’s Yemen Botch It is  becoming clear that the scale of the botch by Donald Trump in Yemen in his first effort at a foreign military action is much greater than .first reported, as reported by Juan Cole.   Right from the start we heard that people in the military were complaining about poor vetting of intel and how there was more military resistance than expected, with one...

by New Deal democrat Four measures of wage growth: prospects for further meaningful wage growth are dimming In the last several years, I have written a number of posts documenting the stagnation in average and median wages, followed by their improvement due to the steep decline in gas prices, for example here and here.  Since bottoming a year ago, gas prices have turned positive YoY, most recently up about 25%. Q4 2016 data on wages has been released, giving...

by New Deal democrat A thought for Sunday: of heartlessness, confidence and conviction First of all, let me join in full in the following from Calculated Risk: These are not normal times, and I can’t just post economic data and remain silent on other issues. Mr. Trump’s executive order is un-American, not Christian, and hopefully unconstitutional. This is a shameful act and no good person can remain silent. I believe that the sheer heartlessness of Trump’s...

(Dan here)n There are all sorts of ideas about what is going on right now in the US, and many proposed opinions. Yves offers an opinion on the Women’s March itself, but I am watching both locally and state wide (MA) where the follow up is actually happening, what forms it takes, and who is involved. Perhaps others can add knowledge and experiences to date. Certainly Democratic party leaders at the national level are searching for responses. I am going to...

From the New York Times comes this information on the nature of immigration in California. Mr. Trump’s immigration policies could transform California’s Central Valley, a stretch of lowlands that extends from Sacramento to Bakersfield. Approximately 70 percent of all farm workers here are living in the United States illegally, according to researchers at University of California, Davis. The impact could reverberate throughout the valley’s precarious...