Reconciliation: How the Democrats Can Run the Table
Congressional Democrats will take office in January with the broadest mandate since the post-Watergate midterms in 1974—twice the popular-vote margin the Contract-with-America Republicans won in 1994. The work begins with dismantling most of what Donald Trump and his corrupt, incompetent administration have done over the past two years. Much of what Trump wrought came through his One Big Beautiful (sic)… 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
The Economic Foundations of this Year’s Mid-Term Elections
The usual explanations for the Democrats' drubbing in this year's mid-term elections have focused mainly on the lopsided number of Democrats up for reelection, especially in red states; low turnout among important parts of the Obama coalition; and the President’s depressed popularity. But there’s also one very basic and underlying issue that played an important part; not only in this…Continue reading
Are Financial Crises the New Normal?
The policy-making committee of the Federal Reserve Board meets again tomorrow, and the news won't be encouraging. The one-percent decline in GDP in the first quarter disposed of the Fed's forecast for 2.9 percent growth this year, and they have to lower it to the range of 2.0 percent to 2.5 percent. That’s just what the IMF did yesterday, forecasting…Continue reading
World Bank Shocker — China’s GDP to Top the U.…
The World Bank shook up a lot of people this week with its declaration that by a new accounting, China’s GDP will top America’s this year. But the meaning and significance of that accounting remain at best elusive. Last year, the World Bank reported that using prevailing exchange rates, China’s GDP in 2012 was barely half that of America ($8.…Continue reading