Trump’s Perfect Storm that Could Sink the American Economy
Donald Trump has steered the American economy into a perfect storm. In the book, film, and now in real life, a rare combination of destructive forces comes together and magnifies the damage. This storm could break the U.S. economy. Trump’s tariffs are the most destructive force. Their first-order damages begin by arbitrarily driving up the prices of every product and… Continue reading
The Surprising Good News about American Incomes
For a change, the latest Census Bureau data on what’s happened to the incomes of Americans is good news. For the first time since the 1990s and 1980s, household incomes rose substantially in 2014, and did so across all demographic groups. You might miss the good news if you looked simply at everyone’s median income or median wage. What’s actually…Continue reading
Where Congress and the President Could Find a Few Trillion…
This year’s presidential hopefuls all agree that America has serious problems, with each party blaming the other. As readers of this blog know, the Number One problem in my view is the end of strong income growth for a majority of American households since 2002. However the candidates define the problem, they all have answers (of sorts), ranging from sweeping…Continue reading
The 2016 Politics of Income Stagnation and Decline
America has a big incomes problem: The incomes of most Americans largely stopped growing around 2002. Wide public resentment over that hard fact already dominates the 2016 debate. On the Democratic side, income issues have been conflated with concerns about inequality, so every plan to cushion the impact on middle-class is financed by more taxes on the unworthy wealthy. From…Continue reading
How Greece Could Short-Circuit the U.S. Expansion
In chaos theory, the flutter of a butterfly’s wing can ultimately cause a typhoon halfway around the world. This week, Greece, a nation with a GDP smaller than the Philippines, became that butterfly – and its ongoing economic struggles could cause storms that would upend the financial stability of Europe and wreak serious collateral damage on our own economy. Greece…Continue reading
What Happens to Your Healthcare When Catastrophes Strike?
Hospitals, clinics, pharmaceutical distributors, and other parts of American healthcare face a quandary: When natural or manmade disasters make their services most vital, the infrastructure they depend on may collapse. Superstorm Sandy highlighted the danger of power outages to patient care. Today, the United States is at increasing risk of blackouts lasting much longer and covering a wider area, from cyberattacks, earthquakes and other…Continue reading
The 2016 Elections Will Be All about Incomes
The key issue in next year’s elections is already clear: Recent Census Bureau data show that after two decades of strong, steady and reliable income growth by American households of virtually every type – the 1980s and 1990s -- as many as two-thirds of households suffered steadily declining incomes as they aged from 2002 to 2013. Yes, the incomes of…Continue reading
Income growth and decline under recent U.S. presidents and the…
The condition of most American households, and of the country as a whole, is set largely by people's income – both the levels, and the income progress that people make as they age from their 20's to their 30's, 40's and 50's. For generations, most Americans have believed that if they work hard, they'll have real opportunities to earn steadily…Continue reading
The Peculiar Economics of Falling Oil Prices
The sharp fall in worldwide oil prices is a silver lining with a silver lining, even if the linings are a bit tarnished. The price of the world's most widely-used commodity has fallen sharply over the last five months, from a spot market price of $115 per-barrel in late June to $77 last week. For consumers everywhere, that means major…Continue reading