Tag Archives: US/Global Economics

February jobs report: the decelerating trend resumes   – by New Deal democrat As I’ve written several times this week, my focus on this report was on whether manufacturing and residential construction jobs turned negative or not, whether temporary jobs continued on their downward trajectory, and whether the deceleration apparent in job growth would reappear after the blockbuster January report. Deceleration absolutely reasserted itself:...

This NYT story just dredges up the stories we would read and hear in the fifties and sixties. Popular song when I was hanging around the coffee houses then. No Starbucks then or laptops. If the song was of your ilk. Arriving in record numbers, the children escaping other countries are ending up in jobs violating child labor laws. Their presence can be found in the factories making the products your own and safe children might be eating or wearing....

For most of my adult life, I’ve learned history almost exclusively by reading books. I took American and World history in high school and two quarters of American history in college, but after that, I became a history autodidact. I’ve written several book reviews (and published three of them), but this is the first course review I’ve written.In a footnote to an article on Ukraine in New York Review of books by British historian Timothy Garton Ash, he...

* Please help my Water Scarcity students by commenting on unclear analysis, alternative perspectives, better data sources, or maybe just saying something nice. David Zetland Bad management and dry taps in Turin, The one-handed economist Kiara writes* Water scarcity in the metropolitan area of Turin (Italy) is the result of climate change, weak government policy, and corruption. Turin’s watershed stretches across 570 km2 at the foot of the...

Real final sales and inventories as portents of recession  – by New Deal democrat As I have mentioned previously from time to time, I read people who have interesting things to say even if their worldview is very different from mine. One such person is Mike Shedlock, a/k/a Mish. He’s an aggressive libertarian and has a long track record as a Doomer, but he frequently parses some thought-provoking economic data. It makes me think, even if I...

David Zetland is teaching a class and he is asking for commentary, Commentary to help his Water Scarcity students by commenting on unclear analysis, alternative perspectives, better data sources, in this post or maybe just saying something nice 🙂 to them. I am sure we can do better . . . “Seville: public water, private interests,” The one-handed economist David writes* The Mediterranean Basin is one of the regions that will suffer the most...

This is another inciteful commentary by “annie asks you.” Just like Josh in the movie “Big,” I am raising my hand, stating “I don’t get it.” I don’t get it as to why people would prefer trump over Biden especially after two years of a recovering economy. Maybe many of them were not around for 2007/8 when the nation did not return to normalcy for years after the crash. A politician finally read the tea leaves, the nature of the economy (which is...

February manufacturing and January construction continue negative, while auto sales improve  – by New Deal democrat We started out yet another month of data with bad news in two leading sectors. The ISM manufacturing index has been showing contraction since November, and its more leading new orders subindex since September. And did so again in February, with the total index increasing slightly to 47.7, and the new orders index rebounding...

The biggest driver of healthcare cost is simply “pricing” increases reflected in hospitals, pharmaceuticals, and healthcare insurance. It was Dr. Donald Berwick while head of Medicare and Medicaid during the 1st half of the Obama administration has said, repeatedly, that at least 1/3 of Medicare dollars ware wasted on unnecessary tests, procedures and drugs that provide no benefit for the patient. Here is Dr. Berwick again discussing healthcare...

by David Zetland (originally published at The one-handed economist) Don’t take water for granted In his 1987 hit, “Diamonds on the soul of her shoes“, Paul Simon sings: She said, “You’ve taken me for grantedBecause I please youWearing these diamonds” This lyric, although a bit paradoxical, has always resonated with me, and I’ve applied it in many “taking-for-granted” situations. One of them concerns clean water, which most of us have...