Tag Archives: US/Global Economics

Gas and oil price update: good news and bad news We’ll get some important house price information tomorrow, but there is no economic news of significance today, so let’s update gas and oil prices. As indicated in the title, there’s good news and bad news. I’ll start with the bad news first. According to GasBuddy, gas prices have not declined in over a week: They have bounced off $3.64/gallon and stabilized at $3.66-7/gallon. Which still...

I do not have an exact date when this was written. It appears to have been update May 2021. I find it interesting as US automakers are making moves to switch from combustion powered vehicles to electrically powered vehicles utilizing rechargeable batteries to provide the power. US automaker Ford is so committed to this conversion; it has split its company into two parts. One part for combustion driven vehicles and another for battery powered...

Weekly Indicators for September 19 – 23 at Seeking Alpha  – by New Deal democrat My Weekly Indicators column is up at Seeking Alpha. For the third week in a row, interest rates increased, and gas prices, along with the prices of other commodities, tumbled. While the decline in gas prices is good, the downturn in other commodity prices is a sign of weakening global demand. Once the decline in gas prices stops, I suspect the economic...

It is refreshing to see Dean Baker using one of the words I use to describe what the FED does when they are hiking Interest Rates. Those FED actions do not create results over night. Because they can’t, read on. Powell appears to be frustrated by the lack of economic slowing. Maybe there are other issues behind the slow reaction such as supply chains, fiscal stimulus early on, healthcare subsidies, etc. The latter two were vital otherwise we...

Summary: More on the Ukraine war, Russia calling up soldiers, Putin’s referendum, and a threat of nuclear consequences if the referendum in interfered. President Biden answers Putin’s threats. New York AG Letitia James filed a $250 million civil lawsuit against Donald Trump, the Trump Organization, and the family. COA rejects Federal Judge Cannon’s ruling calling it “abuse of discretion.” It appears as though Ginni Thomas will be testifying to the...

Herd consolidation seems to be the main point being plugged right now as the total herd population of beef cattle is dropping and will continue to drop well into next year. This mirrors the 2014 cattle year where we had a steep downturn in total US herd. Next year will be more of the same with a general degradation of total population. Here are the factors: Severe drought has brought about pasture shortages. Lack of rain in the western parts...

Healthcare and Politics are the heavy hitters tonight. I always feel like I missed something. Feel free to add articles to this in comments. I have a post to complete on the costs and prices on Pharma. You know there is a difference. Politicians usually talk about one or the other. A while back Germany was wondering if the pharma companies would accept their new pharma schedules. It is a reasonable doubt. How would one know if they did not understand...

David Zetland writes on “replacement theory” (originally published at One Handed Economist) Replacement theory in the US “Replacement theory” is a semi-racist, often-hysterical belief that — in the US — White Christians will be “replaced” by others. The racist part arises from the vapid conception of “race” and/or “White” which rests on no biological or scientific facts. As anyone can tell you, every country (or tribe or community) has its...

Market consolidation is nowhere near revolutionary news these days, as we have seen meat processing plants loom ever larger. Sitting right outside of major or semi-major metropoles, freshly frozen stock of proteins are brought in at all hours of the day and night to sell at a meat retail counter in all large chain grocers around the country. This has more or less been the model since the 1980s where corporate consolidation, mergers, acquisitions, and...

If you believe railroads do not count much anymore in the American economy, you need to rethink your thought. For a major automotive company, I was coordinating shipments to and from Asia via container, rail, and ocean. It was not that hard if you understood the lead times, customs, shipping and rail, and the bottlenecks. Typically we would pick up or ship out of Long Beach or LA. Coming in to us would arrive by rail with the bottleneck being...