Been lucky to have Andrew Sprung of xpostfactoid writing on the topic of perpetrators conceiving, executing, and expanding their carefully planned scheme of large-scale unauthorized plan-switching amongst ACA healthcare insurance subscribers. In the end, people switched over to other plans get lesser healthcare insurance than what they had signed up for initially with a different plan. The plan switch generates a bonus for the person selling a plan...

To reduce private debt and stabilize the economy is a common belief. Many think that simply cutting government spending will solve our economic woes. This is wrong. When governments cut spending, they inadvertently reduce the money supply. This creates a vicious cycle. Less money means less spending. Less spending leads to lower demand. Lower demand results in businesses cutting back, leading to layoffs. The economy shrinks, and private debt becomes more burdensome....

Some concern by Monetarists out there that current short term risk free rate of interest compared to the average of a past period of the short term risk free interest rate is a cause for serious concern wrt equity prices…Think of financial asset prices as a function of the equation P = (A-L)/A where A and L are Depository system Assets and Liabilities…At point 1 the fiscal surpluses were being saved in the TTL accounts at Depositories increasing system L by $100Bs … at point 2 the Fed...

More on the FTC investigating Albertsons and Kroger as to whether they are truly competitors. The issue being how much of the market-controlled now by each and what would result after Kroger acquires Albertsons. Both the FTC and Unions argue “FTC argues different stores have different use cases. FTC lead attorney Susan Musser noted “you can’t just get a single avocado at a Costco, while the union pointed out that many stores, unlike Kroger and...

The history of econometrics There have been over four decades of econometric research on business cycles … But the significance of the formalization becomes more difficult to identify when it is assessed from the applied perspective … The wide conviction of the superiority of the methods of the science has converted the econometric community largely to a group of fundamentalist guards of mathematical rigour … So much so that the relevance of the research to...

Neoliberalism is a political economic philosophy consisting of two claims, one economic and the other political. The economic claim is laissez-faire is the best way to organize economic activity as it generates efficient outcomes that maximize well-being. The political claim is free markets promote individual liberty. This article argues both claims are problematic. The evidence […]

So both the (inverted) yield curve and the Sahm rule indicate a recession. This together with two months of slower employment creation, and the slightly higher unemployment rate, has many wondering whether the economy will crash soon. I discussed before -- a while ago, before the pandemic recession, that had nothing to do with the yield curve -- why an inverted yield curve doesn't necessarily mean a forthcoming recession. The Sahm rule, like the inverted yield curve has an impressive track...

Yes, I get occasional commentaries from this substack. No, I am not going to post it all here. Follow the link after you read what I did post of Claudia Sahm’s here. Labor market conditions. – by Claudia Sahm Tomorrow (9/6) is the jobs report for August 2024. There is intense attention for any clues on the direction of the U.S. labor market, particularly with the Fed set to begin cutting rates in a few weeks and concerns about a possible...

Main Street Gets Left Behind.

Skogskyrkogården — A Masterpiece of Landscape Architecture .[embedded content] Skogskyrkogården, located in the southern suburbs of Stockholm, Sweden, is one of the most iconic cemeteries in the world. Designed by the renowned Swedish architects Gunnar Asplund and Sigurd Lewerentz, it is a UNESCO World Heritage Site and a masterpiece of modernist landscape architecture.