Kevin Drum 🕸

The Wall Street Journal asked Republican voters what they thought of the economy over the past year: Here's the actual data for the past 12 months: Real GDP: Up 2.5% Inflation: CPI down from 8.4% to 3.3% Jobs: Up 3 million Stock Market: S&P 500 up 10% Housing: Median home price down 7% In fairness, ...continue reading "Republicans refuse to believe the economy has improved"

E.J. Dionne says labor is cool again: Young Americans are the country’s most pro-union generation. Labor has poll ratings most politicians only dream about, and the Biden administration is making workers’ pay, benefits and rights its calling card. ....Heralds of change include well-publicized organizing efforts in new sectors of the economy, broad public sympathy for ...continue reading "Raw data for Labor Day: Union wages are way down over the past two years"

You've probably heard that wages have lately been going up faster for the poor than for the affluent. It's true: Don't make too much of this, however. As you can see, nearly everyone is within about 1% of their pre-pandemic wages. The only exception is the very poorest, who are up 6%. But it's worth ...continue reading "Pay is up $32 for the very poorest"

Over at National Review the question of the day is whether President Biden will be impeached: Rich Lowry: So let’s go to you, Phil Klein. Give us percentage odds Republicans will impeach Joe Biden one way or the other. Phil Klein: I’d say about 70 percent that they’ll impeach him. Charlie Cooke: I think it ...continue reading "Will Joe Biden be impeached?"

Bridgette Exman, an assistant superintendent in Mason City, Iowa, describes how she tried to comply with her state's new law banning books in schoolrooms that contain “descriptions or visual depictions of a sex act”: We created a list from several lists of commonly challenged books, then deleted from our list any book challenged for reasons ...continue reading "ChatGPT can help find the racy passages in popular fiction"

Last week I showed you Hilbert rolling around, so this week you get a picture of Charlie rolling around. This is one of his (many) favorite spots, up on a cabinet in our kitchen where he can keep an eye on us and stay near the food bowl. A tummy rub is all it takes ...continue reading "Friday Cat Blogging – 1 September 2023"

I happened to come across some whinging about federal spending earlier this morning and it prompted me to draw this chart: This is all the spending we have control over. Mandatory spending is mostly Social Security and Medicare but contains a chunk of other stuff too. Discretionary spending is defense and domestic spending that's appropriated ...continue reading "We can fix all our problems for 2.7% of GDP"

This is completely ridiculous: More than a year after Roe v. Wade was overturned, many conservatives have grown frustrated by the number of people able to circumvent antiabortion laws — with some advocates grasping for even stricter measures they hope will fully eradicate abortion nationwide. That frustration is driving a new strategy in heavily conservative ...continue reading "Abortion is legal in California. Texas zealots need to get over it."

After adjusting for inflation, average weekly earnings increased at an annualized rate of 4.3% in August: Hourly earnings barely budged, but average hours worked increased 3.6%. This accounted for nearly the entire increase.

The Wall Street Journal has a good roundup of higher interest rates today: The Federal Reserve’s federal-funds rate averaged 0.5% from 2009 through 2021. Today it is between 5.25% and 5.5% and markets think it will be around 3.5% for the next decade. As yet, this has caused little distress. Growth is chugging along, and ...continue reading "High interest rates are about to hit the economy"

The American economy gained a meager 187,000 jobs last month. We need 90,000 new jobs just to keep up with population growth, which means that net job growth clocked in at an even more meager 97,000 jobs. The headline unemployment rate increased to 3.8%. Unemployment rose by 514,000, most of them people who entered the ...continue reading "Chart of the day: Net new jobs through August"

Here it is compared to the previous three presidents:¹ He's right on track. ¹As usual, I've left off George W. Bush because of the huge bump he got from 9/11. It makes normal comparisons useless during the first term of his presidency.

From Politico: A looming child care funding crisis threatens Biden’s economic recovery Nearly $24 billion in federal aid for daycare centers and preschools is slated to run out Sept. 30, roiling a child care system that has underpinned the White House’s efforts to stabilize the broader economy and get people back to work. ....Daycare and ...continue reading "Child care is no longer an emergency"

Ramesh Ponnuru points to a new piece by Lyman Stone that says the decline of religion in America is mostly among the young. In fact: Most of the decline in religion is actually among children, and virtually all of it among people under age 22. This is crazy. Stone presents a whole bunch of charts ...continue reading "Everyone is getting less religious in America"

Sunrise in the desert, near the spot where I set up for astrophotography.

Joe Biden's press secretary says he is "constantly working every day to get things done." National Review's Charles Cooke isn't buying it: This line reflects unmitigated contempt for her audience — which, given KJP’s job, is the entire American public. She knows what she’s saying isn’t true. And she knows that everyone knows that what ...continue reading "Get real, conservatives: Joe Biden is perfectly productive and energetic"

For your amusement here are some details about consumer spending in the second quarter of the year. This chart shows the 15 biggest gainers and losers compared to the first quarter: We started buying eggs again! Sports and air transportation were up considerably too. The biggest loser, for some reason, was audio discs and downloads. ...continue reading "Consumer spending highlights: Eggs are back!"

Brian Merchant defends the Luddites: They were not opposed to progress, and certainly not to technology; most were skilled technicians themselves, who spent their days working on machines at home or in small shops. It is true that the Luddites hammered certain machines to pieces, but it wasn’t technology itself they were protesting — it ...continue reading "ChatGPT can train itself on your book. Deal with it."

Here's the latest from Russia: Russia has got to be the whiniest warmonger in history. They are constantly "accusing" Ukraine of one thing or another, as if it were somehow unfair that they're fighting back. It's a war, Vladimir, and you started it. Don't try to act offended because Ukraine is trying to win.

Consumer spending accelerated to an annualized growth rate of 7.7% in July: Spending growth was up 3.0% from a year ago. This is all good news for soft landing fans, since it suggests that consumer spending remains healthy even as the rest of the economy slows a bit. I've mentioned before that consumer spending almost ...continue reading "Consumer spending stays strong in July"