Kevin Drum 🕸

According to Emmanuel Saez and Gabriel Zucman, here's what the US tax system looks like today compared to 1980: For most people in the middle and upper middle classes, not a lot has changed. Tax rates are a few points lower than they were in 1980, but that's it. There are two big changes: Tax ...continue reading "Raw data: Tax rates since 1980"

From Anna North at Vox: Over the last 30 years, nearly every wealthy country in the world has made it much safer for people to have babies. Only one outlier has moved in the opposite direction: the United States, where the rate of people dying in childbirth continues, stubbornly and tragically, to rise. In 2021, ...continue reading "There is no maternal mortality crisis. The CDC needs to stop saying there is."

Um, what? Luckily for Trump, I guess there are no pictures. Can you imagine the storm of posts he'd be writing if Joe Biden had done this? Hell, there was a storm of posts when Joe Biden didn't do this but a few carefully selected pictures made it look like he had.

Alex Tabarrok says a record number of drugs are in short supply right now. But is this really true? Here are the latest figures from the University of Utah: Huh. Usually when people say this they haven't bothered to check the actual figures. But things have changed since the last time I looked in mid-2022. ...continue reading "A record number of drugs are in short supply"

Why do I keep reading Mideast hawks decrying the Iranian attack on Israel as "unprecedented" and demanding retaliation? They understand why it happened, right? IT WAS BECAUSE ISRAEL ATTACKED IRAN AND KILLED 16 PEOPLE, INCLUDING TWO OF THEIR GENERALS AND TWO CIVILIANS. The Israeli airstrike on April 1 was aimed at Iran's embassy in Damascus. ...continue reading "Why did Iran attack Israel? Hmmm."

If you've heard of the PISA test, you probably think of it as an international test of math and reading skills among high school students. But there's more. For example, they ask principals if bullying is a big problem in their schools. Here are the results for 2015: The Netherlands is the world champ of ...continue reading "The Dutch are the biggest bullies in the world"

Francis Collins, former head of NIH, writes about his recent diagnosis of prostate cancer: Things took a turn about a month ago when my PSA rose sharply to 22 — normal at my age is less than 5. An MRI scan showed that the tumor had significantly enlarged.... New biopsies taken from the mass showed ...continue reading "How quickly should prostate cancer be treated?"

The national media is finally catching up with the latest crime data: Homicides Are Plummeting in American Cities Homicides in American cities are falling at the fastest pace in decades, bringing them close to levels they were at before a pandemic-era jump. Nationwide, homicides dropped around 20% in 133 cities from the beginning of the ...continue reading "Murder in the US is plummeting"

The Washington Post has a piece today about Truth Social that describes how proud they are that they have hundreds of thousands of retail investors: Jerry Dean McLain first bet on former president Donald Trump’s Truth Social two years ago.... That nest egg has lost about half its value in the past two weeks as ...continue reading "“Retail investors” is the nice word for the force behind Truth Social"

The performative bullshit just never stops. Here's a press release from Mac Warner, the West Virginia Secretary of State: In March of 2021, President Biden signed Executive Order 14019 (the “EO”), which improperly claims, “it is the responsibility of the Federal Government to expand access to, and education about, voter registration and election information[.]” ....There ...continue reading "How to win in West Virginia? Fake MAGA outrage, of course."

A couple of weeks ago Israel launched a missile attack on the Iranian embassy in Damascus, killing a general of the Revolutionary Guard. Today Iran retaliated: IDF spokesman Rear Admiral Hagari: More than 200 drones, cruise missiles, and ballistic missiles were fired from Iran. Most of the threats were intercepted outside Israeli airspace. A very ...continue reading "Iran sues for peace"

CBS News joins the moron brigade: Prices in March rose 3.5% from a year ago, accelerating inflation for the third straight month. For U.S. consumers, that means spending more, but actually buying less. CBS News' @jolingkent breaks down prices where some Americans are feeling it the most: the grocery store. Here's the truth about the ...continue reading "Food inflation is close to zero"

Politico has a big piece today about the growth of tax-free retirement accounts—things like 401(k)s and Roth IRAs. The gist of it is that (a) these accounts cost the government just as much as if they were funded directly, and (b) the benefits go largely to the affluent: There's been a surge of expansion since ...continue reading "How the retirement industry is wrecking retirement"

YouGov asks about abortion more often than once a year, which makes it a handy gauge of abortion opinion over the past couple of years since Dobbs. Here it is: It would be nice if they had data before May 2022, but they don't. Still, it's better than most. As it happens, by far the ...continue reading "Raw data: What America thinks about abortion"

Here is Hilbert preparing for the great eclipse. He was disappointed that we couldn't see totality, but after going inside for a nap he got over it pretty quickly.

Donald Trump wanted Congress to kill renewal of the FISA surveillance program: Trump had urged members to “KILL FISA” in a social-media post Wednesday, and holdout Republicans then blocked the bill from proceeding, forcing leaders to scramble to rework the proposal. ....While dozens of mostly minor changes geared at safeguarding privacy were included, an amendment ...continue reading "FISA renewal passes House—unfortunately"

Those of you who are faithful readers already know this, but today Brookings released a report confirming that college costs haven't really gone up that much. They include a handy graphing tool that shows the actual cost of college at various income levels: In the scenario I chose to illustrate this, the actual cost of ...continue reading "Brookings confirms it: The cost of college has barely changed in the past 30 years"

This is—I shit you not—next week's agenda for Republicans on the House Rules Committee: Meh. Nothing more important to do, I guess. But I'm truly disappointed at the lack of cool acronyms. Only freshman congressman Nick Langworthy could be bothered, making HR 7700 into the SUDS Act. Nice one, congressman!

How much humanitarian aid is getting into Gaza? There are two sources for this: Israel itself (via COGAT) and the UN (via OCHA). Here's what they report recently: Up through April 6 both sides mostly agree. Israel reports an average of 190 trucks per day while the UN reports an average of 170. But after ...continue reading "Aid to Gaza is up either 100% or 4%"

You remember Ippei Mizuhara, the interpreter for baseball superstar Shohei Ohtani? He supposedly stole $4 million from Ohtani to pay off gambling debts, but I haven't really been paying attention to this since the story first broke. New York gets me up to speed: According to U.S. Attorney Martin Estrada, Mizuhara got ahold of Ohtani’s ...continue reading "A quick update on Shohei Ohtani’s interpreter"