EconoSpeak

Trump's stonewalling on impeachment is the top story, snore.  Lower down and more important is Trump allowing Turkey to attack the Kurds in Syria with the support of Russia. Even GOP senators do not like this and ISIS fighters may get out. But, heck, those will go to Europe, and unlike the Btis and Canadians, the Kurds did not help us out in Normandy in WW II.  And, probably most important, Trump has major business interests in Turkey.However, much less reported (although covered by David...

The abstract for "Does Medicare Coverage Improve Cancer Detection and Mortality Outcomes?" by Rebecca Mary Myerson, Reginald Tucker-Seeley, Dana Goldman and Darius N. Lakdawalla: Medicare is the largest government insurance program in the United States, providing coverage for over 60 million people in 2018. This paper analyzes the effects of Medicare insurance on health for a group of people in urgent need of medical care – people with cancer. We used a regression discontinuity design to...

This is now about three weeks old news, but it is increasingly clear that it is not clear why it happened or if it will happen again.  There was an outbreak of completely unexpected volatility in the repo market, where in the past the Fed had carried out open market operations, although that had largely passed.  Indeed in more recent years when the Fed has intervened in markets it has been in the reverse repo market.  In any case, interests rates shot up as high as 9 or 10 percent at one...

Trump’s latest excuse for withholding arms for the Ukrainian government to defend itself against Putin’s invitations so he can extract dirt against the Bidens is what again? Oh yea – he wants to root out corruption. REALLY? OK – start with this: KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — As Rudy Giuliani was pushing Ukrainian officials last spring to investigate one of Donald Trump’s main political rivals, a group of individuals with ties to the president and his personal lawyer were also active in the former...

Yes, Iraq.  It has not made front page headlines with so much else going on, but over the lat several days there has been an escalating series of protests against corruption in various parts of Iraq, but culminating yesterday in Baghdad with one that was met by soldiers firing openly upon the demonstarters with the result being about 104 dead and 6100 wounded.  The government of Adel Abdul Mahdi appears in danger of facing a no confidence motion and falling as it has lost the support of...

I think we all know AG Barr lied about the Mueller report but permit me to go back to this: The moment Attorney General William Barr laid eyes on a letter from special counsel Robert Mueller criticizing Barr's summary of his two-year investigation, he knew his goose was cooked. Mueller was creating a written record that wouldn't allow Barr to bastardize his concerns the way he had mischaracterized Mueller's report. “Bob, what’s with the letter? Why didn’t you just pick up the phone and call...

There is a special section containing 11 columns in today's (October 2, 2019) Washington Post on the first anniversary of the murder of its former columnist from Saudi Arabia, Kamal Khashoggi.  I shall quote from some of these columns.From "Khashoggi's horrifying final seconds" by David Ignatius:"The authorization to kill Khashoggi, if that became necessary, came in a second order, from [Saud] Qahtani." [a top aide to Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman aka "MbS"]"What does Qahtani say...

While most US media  claims China (PRC) has the world's second largest economy, that is only true as measured in nominal terms.  Measured in real PPP terms, Chinese GDP surpassed that of the US in 2015 and contnes to move further ahead of it (and is likely to pass it in nominal terms very soon), despite gradual deceleration of the Chinese GDP growth rate.  Furthermore, PRC seems to be taking global leadership in crucial 5G technology.  In the last 70 years the PRC has gone from a poor nation...

I am referring to Kurt Volker: The president's lawyer Rudy Giuliani has revealed text messages of conversations between himself and senior officials at the State Department that he says show they endorsed his controversial dealings with Ukraine…During an appearance on Fox News show The Ingraham Angle last night, Giuliani revealed 15 text messages between himself, U.S. Special Representative to Ukraine Kurt Volker, and U.S. Ambassador to the European Union Gordon Sondland. When I first...

Lost in the shuffle this past week was one piece of good news for Trump: a tentative trad deal with Japan that he and Japan's PM Shinzoe Abe signed in New York on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly meeting.  While it is largely a favorable deal, it does not do too much and leaves the most difficult issue to be resolved by later negotiation, namely regarding the auto industry.Trade restrictions are lowered on a variety of agricultural goods, including pork, beef, wheat, corn, and some...