70 Words

Dumbo Decision

11/22/2013

The Friday File: In a moment of economic madness, the US government recently destroyed six tons of ivory, equivalent to the ivory from 2,000 elephants, and worth $16.3 million, or $8,200/elephant. With only 200,000 elephants left and a record 25,000…

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It’s Electric

11/21/2013

A problem with solar and wind energy is that it’s intermittent. Since renewables generally have grid priority over other sources, when renewables surge other sources must rapidly decline to compensate. But since nuclear and coal plants are designed to run…

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Fed Funding

11/20/2013

Reading the just released minutes from the most recent Fed meeting, it sounds like when the Fed starts reducing its monthly purchases of $85 billion in treasuries and MBS, the Fed will concurrently announce that it will keep short term…

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Halting Housing

11/19/2013

In Q3, investment in home improvements was $178 billion, while construction spending on new single family (SF) houses and townhouses was $172 billion, each about one percent of GDP. Similarly, in Q1 spending on home improvements was $161 billion, slightly…

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Women’s Work

11/18/2013

After losing 2.7 million jobs in the Great Recession, 68 million women are now working, 100,000 below the all-time high set in 4/08. By contrast, men lost 5.9 million jobs in the Recession, and currently 76.4 million men are employed,…

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A Wealth of Art

11/15/2013

The Friday File: In a sign of how well the super-rich are doing, a recent contemporary/postwar art auction netted $692 million, breaking the record of $495 million set in May. A triptych by Francis Bacon went for $142.2 million, a…

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Puerto Rican Problem

11/14/2013

Since special federal manufacturing tax breaks were eliminated in 2006, Puerto Rico’s economy has shrunk by 16% and its population by almost 4%. Worse, with $70 billion in bonds outstanding (more than all but NY and CA) there is fear…

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Berlin Boost

11/13/2013

Since 2006, Germany has been running annual trade surpluses of over 6% of GDP, making it hard for Southern European nations to export their way to prosperity. While the EU is employing harsh adjectives with Berlin in an attempt to…

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Pleasing Data Points

11/12/2013

While most of the economic data released last week was hum drum, the two biggest data points surprised to the upside. Q3 GDP came in at 2.8%, when all genius economists expected 2%, and employment growth was a robust 204,000,…

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The Great War

11/11/2013

During the seven and a half months the US fought in WWI, 116,516 American soldiers were killed, almost 9% of all US war deaths and more deaths than in all US wars combined since, with the exception of WWII. During…

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