Econ70

Since 1992, there have been four instances when Y-o-Y headline inflation, as measured by the CPI, rose by nearly 4% or more; in 2000, from late 2005 to mid-2006, from Jan-September 2008, when inflation reached 5.5%, and in September 2011.…

While higher corporate taxes are unlikely to boost corporate investment, they reduce it less than you think. Absent a corporate income tax, firms borrow to invest in plant and equipment if the return on investment exceeded the interest rate. By…

The Friday File: The price of ketchup packets has risen 13% since 1/20, as their market share has exploded at the expense of tabletop bottles. Catsup is the most consumed table sauce in the US with about 300,000 tons sold…

The economy continues to roar back to life. The Institute for Supply Management’s services index rose to a record high of 63.7 in March, and in the process blew away the previous high of 60.9 of 10/18. This is great…

The price index for personal-consumption expenditures rose 1.6% year-over-year, and the core index, which excludes energy and food, and is the Fed’s favorite measure of inflation, rose just 1.4% over the same period. This means prices in 2/21 were only…

Initial weekly jobless claims, a proxy for layoffs, were 719,000 for the week ending 3/27/21 and 658,000 for the prior week! These are the two lowest readings since the pandemic began, and they have been gradually trending down since 1/1/21.…

916,000 net new jobs in March, upward revisions from 379,000 to 468,000 in February and from 166,000 to 233,000 in January!! 347,000 people entered the labor force, and the unemployment rate fell from 6.3% to 6.0%! Hopefully, we see numbers…

The Friday File: Straight and gay men who reveal on dating websites that they own a dog have “like” rates that are, on average, 20% higher. For women, dog ownership confers a 3% boost. Conversely, for straight men, having a…

Recently released international data shows the number of graphs used by major TV networks to explain economic and epidemiological phenomena may be peaking. Social scientists are calling this “Peak Graph” and suggest that graphs showing the use of graphs may…

This recession has been different from all others not just because spending on goods boomed, when normally it falls, but because spending on services, which usually barely dips, tanked. In 20Q4 Y-o-Y inflation-adjusted goods spending was up 7.2%; it was…