Tag Archives: Hot Topics

Some foreboding signs and portents from consumption and employment data  – by New Deal democrat I have a special post up at Seeking Alpha, looking at some very troubling signs from several of the high frequency indicators I track weekly as to consumption and employment. Click over and read the whole article, but here is a little taste: the below is what the YoY% change in the 20-day total of payroll tax withholding has been in has been as of...

As usual I am reading a lot about how the latest shocking election outcome shows the polls were wrong and that polling has become unreliable (no links I’ve been reading this on Twitter). This is not a new assessment of the polls. It was widely argued (again Twitter now I cite Yglesias by name) that the polls were probably wrong. The alleged errors are exact opposites. Before the election, it was widely (to universally) asserted that polls implied...

I think I am sitting in the worst possible place one could be pre-election . . . Arizona. The potential insurrectionists were trying to take over the state. We prevailed only by a few votes. People I know are angry Democrats won. By all intents and purposes this is not over. We still need to resolve January 6. Annie has a good message of hope on this Sunday. I hope you enjoy the read. “Post-Election Day Musings…The Sun Begins to Shine” –...

“Weekly Indicators for November 7 – 11″ at Seeking Alpha  – by New Deal democrat My Weekly Indicators post is up at Seeking Alpha. Although a few indicators are holding up, in the past month there has been almost continual deterioration in several employment and consumption metrics. These are particularly important for whether the consumer is pulling back, typically a signal that a recession is close to imminent. As usual, clicking over...

Infidel753: “Immediate post-election observations,” Infidel753 Blog There was no red wave.  There was no blue wave.  Most incumbents got re-elected.  Whichever side ends up controlling the House and Senate will have a razor-thin margin. Turnout was very high on both sides and the process ran smoothly pretty much everywhere, so it was a big win for democracy. If the Republicans get the House majority, the margin will be small and the...

“Postal workers and allies to protest DeJoy’s Ten-Year Plan at BOG meeting, Save the Post Office, Steve Hutkins I missed this announcement at Steve Hutkins “Save The Post Office” blog. Apparently a large number of US Post Office supporters went to the Governor’s meeting and expressed their opinion on Postmaster Louis DeJoy’s plan to centralize sorting away from the neighborhood post offices. In effect, this action places a much larger burden on...

Real average hourly wages and real aggregate payrolls for October  – by New Deal democrat With yesterday’s report on October consumer prices, we can take up two of my favorite measures of how the working/middle class is doing – real average non-supervisory wages, and real aggregate payrolls. Real average wages for non-supervisory workers declined -0.1% for the month. They are -5% below their pandemic lockdown peak (which, recall, was...

October CPI report: total inflation increasing at 3.5% annual rate, core inflation minus shelter increasing at 2.8% annual rate in the past 4 months  – by New Deal democrat For a full year now I’ve been hammering the fact that the official CPI measure of housing inflation, “owners’ equivalent rent,” seriously lags actual house prices as measured by the most popular housing indexes. I said then, and I have reiterated almost every month since,...

I lived in Michigan for 27 years having moved from Madison Wisconsin. If I had my choice, we would have stayed in Madison. It was damn cold in the winter. We were still able to do things though. Michigan was not quite the same. It was never really home for us. Just too many things not right. The politics were deeply Republican in our county. The roads were in poor to fair condition, taxes were too low, and the county favored business. Voting...

Jobless claims: still holding steady  – by New Deal democrat Initial jobless claims rose slightly, by 7,000, from one week ago to 225,000. The 4 week average declined -250 to 218,750. Continuing claims also rose slightly, by 6,000, to 1,493,000: This is right in the middle of where claims have been for the last 6 months. If anything, there might be a slight rising trend in the last month. The jobs market remains very tight. Aside from...