Tag Archives: US/Global Economics

A bit of Kevin Drum: “Raw data: Gasoline during my lifetime,” jabberwocking.com, Kevin Drum. I had just been discharged from Marine Corp active duty in 71, married, and bought a boxy Datson 510 to get around in the Chicago suburbs. Finished up at one college in 72 and started finishing my BA at another college 40-something miles away. The1.8 litre with a three speed Borg Warner transmission Datsun paid off at 30 miles to the gallon. I hauled...

Consumer spending holds up well in August, despite ending of disinflation  – by New Deal democrat  As I have repeated for the past several months, in the current economy the personal spending and income report is just as important as the jobs report. That’s because, despite the downturn in manufacturing production and many parts of the housing market, consumer spending especially on services has continued to power the economy forward....

I am struggling with thoughts about status quo bias. I see many issues where a proposal to do something new is subject to severe scrutiny which is not applied to the implicit proposal to keep doing what we have been doing. The logic is small c conservative — better to stick with what we know than to take a chance. In many critically important cases, this makes no sense, as we are not in a steady state and things won’t stay the same (being what we...

Income-based pricing is a bad idea, The one-handed economist, David Zetland I learned, via GS, that some Berkeley researchers have proposed [pdf] customers should pay for electricity based on their income. Thus, I would pay half of what you would pay if I made half the income you did. This is a terrible idea, IMO, but I can see how we got here, which I explain in two phases: charges related to costs (points 1-3) and charging rich people more...

People tend to say things are bad and getting worse. They tend to get irritated when I note that the thing they mentioned is bad but has recently become less bad. There is some deep unwillingness to accept that levels, changes, and rates of change are different. Certainly people will argue that something is too low because it has decreased (see military spending over GDP) or getting worse because it is bad (see again military spending — different...

The 2022 Globie: Money and Empire by Joseph Joyce Every year we name a book the “Globalization Book of the Year” (aka the “Globie”). The prize is (alas!) strictly honorific and does not come with a monetary award. But announcing the award gives me a chance to draw attention to a recent book—or books—that are particularly insightful about globalization. Previous winners are listed at the bottom of the column (also see here and here). This...

Unionize America sea to shining sea — do away with the biggest threat to democracy — with one easy federal labor law stroke. On Today’s Page (ontodayspage.blogspot.com), Denis Drew. Denis Drew has a commentary unions and federal Labor Law. Conjuring up a potential labor market where all businesses are family owned and family operated. Where no outside labor is hired and prices of goods and services are set at the highest amount families...

The 2024 presidential election will be between Joe Biden and Donald Trump. Of that we can be certain. We can also be certain that the vote will be very close, and there are geopolitical players who will put their thumbs on the scale. “The Saudi Kingdom’s de facto rule Mohammad bin Salman’s coziness with the Trump family is notorious. Meanwhile, if Trump defeats Biden next year that would allow Vladimir Putin to escape the most monumental mistake of...

Simple commentary. Just started to receive information on increases. Gasoline is a no brainer. We drive a fuel efficient vehicle and do five over as opposed to what others do. It is interesting to hear the complaints. Thirty-gallon gasoline tank plus fast driving and you are getting into some serious money. You can only tell them if they will listen. Most will not and get belligerent. Saudi Arabia and Russia have agreed to extend their voluntary...

Too Big, too Loud, and Too fast appears to be the thing these days. Either they are jacked up squatting, large tired, multiple rear tires, altered mufflered, adjusted emission control to emit soot from acceleration, etc. Anything to gain attention for those who probably never received such while growing up. As children, we all had our favorite displays of machoism and then we grew up. Other things became more important than the vehicle we drove....