Based on Incomes, Americans Are a Lot Better Off Under…
In their only 1980 presidential debate, Ronald Reagan posed a famous question that sealed Jimmy Carter's political fate: "Are you better now than you were four years ago?" Bill Clinton similarly denied George H. W. Bush a second term in 1992 by running a campaign based on James Carville's famous expression, "It's the economy, stupid." Donald Trump faces a real… Continue reading
The Senate Is Even More Anti-Democratic Than You Think
Donald Trump’s efforts to dominate American democracy may seem sui generis. Certainly, no other president has dismissed the results of a national election he lost, rallied supporters to violently prevent Congress from certifying that loss and called for ignoring the Constitution to facilitate his return to power. But Americans have long struggled with the country’s foundational anti-democratic features—fighting a civil…Continue reading
What Really Happened to Silicon Valley Bank
If you thought Big Finance and its regulators learned prudence and humility from the financial crisis, the past week's events were a rude wake-up call. The collapse of Silicon Valley Bank (SVB) has several subplots. The most obvious was its astonishingly stupid investment strategy of concentrating its assets in instruments whose market value would decline as interest rates rose. .…Continue reading
Inflation Reality Check: Don‘t Blame Wages and Salaries
Yes, economics can be complicated, and economic reporters work under tight deadlines. That’s no excuse for the media meme that blames rising wages for much of today’s inflation. The Wall Street Journal summed up this erroneous view in a recent headline, “Rapid Wage Growth Keeps Pressure on inflation.” The Journal’s self-serving take is refuted by the data and rejected by…Continue reading
The Decline and Possible Resurrection of Radical Gerrymandering
Given Donald Trump’s plot to overturn the 2020 presidential election, it’s unsurprising that a recent survey by the National Opinion Research Center found that 52 percent of Americans believe that our democracy is in serious trouble. Their skepticism includes congressional gerrymandering—when the party controlling the state legislature draws the state’s congressional and state legislative districts in ways that give them…Continue reading
The Economy Is Doing Fine, for the Time Being
Republican charges of a “Biden recession” during the midterm campaign failed to ignite a red wave, and the latest release of data from the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) explains why. In the third quarter, the economy grew 2.9 percent after inflation. That strong growth is revised from the BEA’s 2.6 percent estimate released just before the midterm election, and…Continue reading
C’mon, Democrats, Tout Your Economic Record: It’s a Very Good…
Drawing on the fact-free politics of Donald Trump, Republicans are selling the meme that Americans are much worse off economically and financially under President Joe Biden and the Democrats. That is demonstrably untrue. Yet, the Democrats’ main response has been to mumble an apology for the inflation they didn’t cause and try and change the subject. That approach won’t work,…Continue reading
Who Was Hired and Who Was Fired during the Pandemic
COVID-19 unleashed an earthquake in American labor markets—and its aftershocks are still with us. In March-May 2020, 20.3 million people abruptly lost their jobs; only half as many were hired over the following seven months. But businesses hired workers at turbocharged rates in 2021 and 2022. By May and June of this year, employment had fully recovered from the pandemic.…Continue reading
Yes, Americans Are Better Off Under Biden
Ronald Reagan closed his presidential debate with Jimmy Carter in October 1980 urging Americans to ask if they were better off than they were four years ago. Of course, Reagan, like a sharp prosecutor, knew the answer before he asked the question. Inflation and unemployment were soaring. Perhaps the reason why Republicans aren’t posing that question today is that they…Continue reading