Economy

The Costs of Covid Shutdowns

Featured image It was obvious early in the covid epidemic that the benefits of lockdowns were speculative and hypothetical, while the costs were large and undeniable. Now that the dust has settled, those costs can be quantified. My staff has produced two new papers on the costs of the covid shutdowns in Minnesota. While their analyses are state-specific, it is reasonable to assume that their findings would be reflected in other states, »

Get Woke, Be Downgraded?

Featured image BlackRock Inc. is the world’s largest investment company. It has also been the leader in ESG (environmental, social, governance) investing–i.e., prioritizing a left-wing agenda over shareholder returns. It seems, finally, that BlackRock’s political agenda is dragging the company down: Brennan Hawken, an analyst at [UBS], downgraded the stock of BlackRock (NYSE: BLK) to Neutral from Buy and slashed the stock price target to $585 from $700 over growing pushback to »

Rampant Inflation Dims Dems’ Hopes

Featured image Cost of living data are out for September, and they are grim. The Wall Street Journal reports: U.S. consumer inflation excluding energy and food accelerated to a new four-decade high in September, a sign that strong and broad price pressures are persisting. The Labor Department on Thursday said that its so-called core consumer-price index—which excludes volatile energy and food prices—rose 6.6% in September from a year earlier, the biggest increase »

Can We Have Accountability For the Covid Shutdowns?

Featured image From early in the covid epidemic, it seemed obvious that the shutdowns ordered by nearly all governors and many municipalities did little good and caused tremendous damage. Experience has borne out that conclusion, but almost everywhere, governments have moved on without any accounting for the mistakes that were made. American Experiment has just released two papers that address the consequences of covid shutdowns. While their specific focus is on Minnesota, »

Liz Trussed

Featured image Back in 1980, as Britain’s economy fell into steep recession along with much of the rest of the world, recently installed prime minister Margaret Thatcher came under fire for her policies of spending restraint and tax cuts. Much of her own party wanted her to backtrack, never mind the opposition Labour Party and the media. It was in the midst of this that the “Iron Lady” lived up to her »

Mister, Can You Spare a Dime?

Featured image Times are tough, although the elites that run our country probably haven’t noticed. But for most of us, the rising costs of gasoline, electricity, manufactured goods and groceries, along with a decline in the value of our savings and the prospect of paying for trillions in new federal deficits, are alarming. How worried are Americans? This worried: Rasmussen finds that 57% of Americans are expecting a depression: The latest Rasmussen »

Margaret Thatcher 2.0?

Featured image British Prime Minister Liz Truss is going big. Her Chancellor, Kwasi Kwarteng, has unveiled an aggressive program of permanent tax cuts. The Wall Street Journal likes the plan: Mr. Kwarteng axed the 2.5-percentage-point increase in the payroll tax imposed by former Prime Minister Boris Johnson, and canceled a planned increase in the corporate income tax rate to 26% from 19%. … Kwarteng also surprised by eliminating the 45% tax rate »

I’ve Seen Gaslighting and I’ve Seen the Stock Market Tank

Featured image The Dow was down 1,276 points today, or 4%. Why? The August inflation number came in worse than expected: The new data showed the consumer-price index rose 8.3% in August from the same month a year ago. That was down from 8.5% in July and 9.1% in June—the highest inflation rate in four decades. But on a month-to-month basis, the figures showed inflation accelerating in August, dashing investors’ hopes that »

Blueprint for malarkey

Featured image On Friday the White House released “the Biden-Harris economic blueprint” a/k/a “the President’s Economic Blueprint” (press release here, 58-page document here). It’s a “blueprint” with “five pillars” that have done so much for us already and promise to do more and worse in the future. Performing the work that our native media fact-check workers refuse to do, James Bovard assesses the veracity of claims made in the “blueprint.” He introduces »

Robert Reich vs Dave Chappelle on Economics (& Common Sense)

Featured image As you may have heard, Robert Reich, who increasingly looks like a parody of an old man yelling at clouds, is very concerned about equality. Very very concerned. Almost obsessively concerned. Actually, strike “almost” from the previous sentence. His egalitarianism extends to the WNBA. Reich finds it scandalous that WNBA players aren’t paid the same as NBA players. Never mind getting schooled by any libertarian walking down the street, as »

Will Our Cities Come Back?

Featured image This Research Brief from the Institute of Governmental Studies at Berkeley measures the extent to which cities and, specifically, downtowns have recovered from the covid shutdowns. The piece is noteworthy because of its methodology: it uses cell phone data to track the extent to which people are returning to various cities and the downtown areas within those cities, so it is based on objective reality. I encourage you to follow »

From zero to Nero

Featured image In their own way President Biden’s White House minders must be just about as far gone as he is. With the announcement that Consumer Price Index had declined year-over-year from 9.1 percent to 8.5 percent, they thought it made sense to push the line that the numbers reflect “zero inflation last month” (i.e., on a month to month basis). The Bureau of Labor Statistics data are compiled here (home page) »

Whose Recession?

Featured image The Biden administration has tried to redefine “recession” to avoid responsibility for two consecutive quarters of GDP decline. Has that rather pitiful effort worked? No, according to Rasmussen Reports: Despite denials from the White House, most voters think the American economy is in a recession – and agree that Democrats are to blame for it. A new national telephone and online survey by Rasmussen Reports finds that 62% of Likely »

Quote of the week that was

Featured image White House Economic Council Director joined White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre for the July 26 press briefing last week. The White House has posted the transcript here. Talking up the strength of our economy by comparison with others, Deese actually said this: Well, look, I think that our — our economy is more resilient to the — to the types of challenges that we’ve faced. For example, you know, »

The Recession Is Here. Does It Matter?

Featured image The Biden administration is continuing its effort to spin bad economic news. Biden’s statement on today’s negative GDP report avoided any reference to recession, or even to the fact that the GDP number was negative. Coming off of last year’s historic economic growth – and regaining all the private sector jobs lost during the pandemic crisis – it’s no surprise that the economy is slowing down as the Federal Reserve »

Yes, we have a banana

Featured image As we inferred from the Biden administration’s verbal gymnastics this week, today’s Commerce Department report indicates that we are in a conventionally understood recession. According to the department, the economy contracted for a second straight quarter, with growth falling at a 0.9 percent annual rate in the April-June period. The Bureau of Economic Analysis explains: “Real gross domestic product (GDP) decreased at an annual rate of 0.9 percent in the »

Recessional

Featured image The Biden administration continues to prepare the battlefield for the Commerce Department’s second-quarter 2022 GDP estimate on Thursday. Administration officials must anticipate an estimate reflecting that we are in a recession, because they are making fools of themselves to deflect it in the meantime. What they really need to do is bring back the late Carter administration economic official Alfred Kahn and dub it the banana. “Between 1973 and 1975 »