I am now in a very hot and humid Kyoto having left Australia yesterday in weather that was in some places 20 or more degrees Celsius above the norm for early Spring. The heat here and back home at this time of year is rather scary given what it portends. I also do not have much time today given I have been contending with various ‘moving in’ requirements. But I read an article on the plane last night which I think marks a divide between what ‘green’ progressives think and what I think is...

Siri: “Hey Jill, how are you? Anything you would like to talk about?”Jill: “I fell while hiking today.”Siri: “Were you hurt?”Jill: “Left ankle is somewhat swollen and sore from jamming the foot into a rock while trying to stay upright.”Siri: “Sorry to hear that, Jill. Any idea why you fell?”Jill: “I don’t know, just fell.”Siri: “Did you feel dizzy?”Jill: “No.”Siri: “Did you trip?”Jill: “I guess so.”Siri: “Why do you think that, Jill?”Jill: “I think...

It’s time for me to have my final say on a dispute with Matt Yglesias that has been going at a fairly slow pace. A couple of weeks ago, Matt put up a post (really a Substack newsletter, but I still think in blog terms), headlined Polarization is a choice with the subtitle, “Political elites justify polarizing decisions with self-fulfilling prophesies” I responded with a snarky but (I thought) self-explanatory note, saying “Peak both sidesism here. Republicans want to overthrow US...

Blog Reducing the stealth subsidy to banks The banking sector is set to receive over £200bn from the Bank of England. Tiering reserves could save the public finances billions. By Dominic Caddick 22 September 2023 While the state has to deal with...

We’re not out of the woods yet with tax drain. 

Robert C. Hockett joins this week as a special guest. Robert is an American lawyer, law professor, and policy advocate. He holds two positions at Cornell University (the Edward Cornell Professor of Law at Cornell Law School and a Professor of Public Affairs), is senior counsel at investment firm Westwood Capital, LLC, and was a Fellow at The Century Foundation think tank. As of 2019, he is advising Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez on the Green New Deal.

THIS is better than an economics career...

Using the stock market and unemployment as an easy and timely coincident recession indicator  – by New Deal democrat My fellow forecaster Bob Dieli has a measure he calls “DeltaDelta,” basically an average of the YoY% change in the stock market and the unemployment rate (which hopefully he won’t mind me mentioning here). It called to mind that occasionally in the past I have noted that a YoY decline in stock prices is a yellow flag for a...

Patients already paying price for PBMs diverting copay cash meant for needy, WSYX, Part 3, Darrel Rowland Part 3 of a 3-part investigation adding the detail of what is occurring with the PBMs. In a nut shell, Patients are told that they can avoid huge out-of-pocket spending for their drug and obtain their prescription for free. Yet what may not be clear to patients is that their deductible, coinsurance, and other out-of-pocket obligations are...

There has been much laughter over the fact that Donald Trump has repeatedly given the impression that he thinks that stealth technology works at the wavelength of visible light, so stealthy aircraft are invisible. He isn’t the only one who is saying silly things based on ignoring wavelength. The technology used by the F117, F22, and F35 does not hide planes from world war II era radar. The old radar used long wavelength waves. They are reflected...