Month: June 2021

The Fed is currently beginning a long road to monetary policy normalization. The Fed will first talk of tapering, and in early 2022 begin tapering its purchases of Treasuries and MBS. Next, in mid-2022 talk of raising rates will commence,…

Prior to Covid-19, 5 million Americans were unemployed, and the unemployment rate was 3.5%. Today, we are 7.6 million jobs short compared to before the recession. Together, that sums to 12.6 million. However, today 9.3 million Americans are unemployed. That…

In 21Q1, non-farm hourly compensation rose at an inflation-inducing annualized rate of 7.2%. However, in 21Q1, non-farm labor productivity grew at an annualized rate of 5.5%. Thus, unit labor costs increased by a very manageable annualized rate of 1.7%. Thinking…

The Friday File: An Italian artist just had an immaterial sculpture, an artwork of literally nothing, auctioned for $18,300. In February, the same artist exhibited another immaterial sculpture in Milan demarcated by a square of tape on a walkway. Since,…

China’s 2020 population hit 1.41 billion. While up slightly from 1.34 billion in 2010, it has peaked and will now start falling. China’s working age population has been declining since 2011. The percentage of the population over 60 has risen…

In 1959, US household energy spending was 7.3% of after-tax income. It then steadily declined, and outside the 1973 and 1980 Arab oil shocks when it peaked at 9.5%, it bottomed at 4% in 2002. At the height of the…

Inflation, as measured by the CPI, is up 4.2% Y-o-Y. However, a year ago Covid-19 had our economy reeling and the prices for things like oil and car rentals collapsing. To bypass the impacts of Sars-Cov-2 on prices, compare to…

Employers created 559,000 net new jobs in May, dropping the unemployment rate to 5.8%, its average rate since modern data collection began in 1948. From 1980-1999 the average was 6.5%, from 2000-2019 it was 5.9%. Prior to Sars-Cov-2 it was…

The Friday File: Since starting in 1996, Judy Sheindlin will have adjudicated roughly 12,750 cases when her last show airs on 6/8/21. Judge Judy has had the #1 first-run show in syndicated TV for 11 straight years, and is on…

Fed purchases of Treasuries drives down rates and drives up the price of financial assets like stocks/bonds and real assets like houses. If banks are reluctant to lend, as they currently are, the money the Fed pays the banks for…