Kevin Drum 🕸

How's the ol' labor force doing? The Wall Street Journal says today that "several million" workers have dropped out of the workforce permanently thanks to COVID-19, but I suspect that yet again this is a misconception that comes from looking at the entire labor force instead of just the prime-age labor force. Here are the ...continue reading "Raw data: Prime age workers in the post-COVID era"

Progress is slow. My distance vision is now 20/20—though barely—and I had my second adjustment on Wednesday. This should improve my distance vision slightly and my reading vision considerably. For now, though, things are still pretty fuzzy. I can read and use the computer without glasses, which my doctor wants me to do, but it's ...continue reading "Eyeball update and more"

Charlie seems to be mesmerized by something, but what? Is Marian holding up a can of cat food? Is she getting ready to toss a toy Charlie's way? Or is it just the big glass eye that has him enthralled? I'm afraid the answer is lost in the mists of history.

Russia really seems to take it personally when a country they've invaded decides to  fight back: Thunderous blasts echoed in the capital, Kyiv, and in Ukraine’s eastern battle zone on Friday, a day after Russia’s most important warship in the Black Sea sank while being towed to port, marking a humiliating wartime setback for Moscow. ...continue reading "Russia says it blew up its own ship, but takes it out on Ukraine anyway"

This is last night's sunset over North Tustin. I was out on a different photographic mission and caught this on my way home.

My earlier post reminds me that I've uncharacteristically made a few economic predictions lately: 30-year fixed mortgages will break 5%. Home prices will stop rising and might even drop 10% by the end of the year. Gasoline prices will drop 40-50 cents within the next couple of weeks. Inflation will start to recede by late ...continue reading "Kevin’s economic predictions for 2022"

Me, three weeks ago: We can cross our fingers and hope that mortgage rates don't go up to 5%, but that's a vain hope....The workhorse 30-year fixed mortgage is almost certain to average 5% or more over the rest of this year. Freddie Mac, today: This week, mortgage rates averaged five percent for the first ...continue reading "Mortgage rates break 5% for the first time in a decade"

The price of oil is down but the price of gasoline isn't. What's going on? Here's an update of my chart from last week comparing oil and gasoline prices: This uses the same formula as before to regress the price of oil on gasoline,¹ and last week it suggested the price of gasoline was about ...continue reading "Gasoline should drop 50 cents per gallon over the next week or two"

A year ago Twitter founder Jack Dorsey auctioned off an NFT of his very first tweet. It sold on March 22, 2021: After it spent just over two weeks on the market, Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey has sold his first tweet as an NFT for the weirdly specific figure of $2,915,835.47. The winning bidder was ...continue reading "Dorsey NFT declines 99.991% in 13 months"

A sailboat off Corona Del Mar catches the late afternoon sun.

I don't normally bother posting the producer price index, but since inflation is on everyone's mind these days let's take a look at the latest numbers: Not good! The PPI for goods was up 11.2% from last year and the monthly increase from February came to 17.8% on an annualized basis. In both cases they ...continue reading "Chart of the day: The Producer Price Index vs. the Consumer Price Index in March"

You've been waiting all night on the edge of your beds for this, so here are the results of yesterday's toilet poll: This is my closest poll ever! Given the margin of error, it's a dead heat. Perhaps this now demands a bit of actual research to come up with an answer.

I met a friend for lunch this afternoon and called his attention to the design of this toilet: The handle and the seat work together to force (men) to lower the seat in order to flush the toilet. I think this is deliberate design (it's an all-gender restroom). My friend thinks it's just an unplanned ...continue reading "A toilet poll"

Tim Cook says that disaster will befall us if Apple is forced to allow users to download apps that aren't sold through Apple's official App Store: “Taking away a more secure option will leave users with less choice—not more,” Mr. Cook said Tuesday during a speech at the International Association of Privacy Professionals’ summit in ...continue reading "Apple has your best interests at heart when they restrict access to the iPhone"

The Washington Post has a piece today about the return of young children to school after a year and a half at home due to the pandemic. Mostly it's about socialization, with teachers saying that kids are more fidgety, more likely to get into minor scuffles on the playground, and less able to make connections ...continue reading "A pandemic puzzler: Kids can no longer tie their shoes"

I went to a wedding this weekend! Here's an artsy shot. Oh, and my old friends at Mother Jones are having a fundraiser. Go give them some money! They deserve it. And be sure to read Monika Bauerlein's letter about why the fundraiser is a little late this year. I confess that I was never ...continue reading "Lunchtime Photo"

The LA Times writes today about the vast army of Twitter bots that fly into action whenever Tesla has some bad news and could use a little PR help. They've been doing this for the past decade: Over that period, Tesla lost an accumulated $5.7 billion, even as its stock soared and Musk became one ...continue reading "How much is Tesla overvalued?"

Here's an interesting thing. I was looking at Joe Biden's approval level trying to figure out what events plausibly produced especially big drops when I happened upon YouGov's tracking poll. Most polls consist of responses from all adults, but the YouGov poll is limited to registered voters. This makes a difference: Gallup's poll, like most ...continue reading "Raw data: Joe Biden’s approval among registered voters"

People like me talk frequently about the fact that folks who are modestly right of center are obviously scared by a lot of the Democratic stands on culture war issues these days. Perhaps we should dial down the way we talk—or maybe even what we genuinely believe—about these things? People to my left demand particulars. ...continue reading "Should Democrats change their tune on a few culture war topics?"

Today is inflation day, and the BLS reports that the US inflation rate rose considerably less than than the European rate jump announced a few days ago. But it still went up a lot. The headline inflation rate increased from 7.9% in February to 8.5% in March: (Note that this chart shows headline CPI, which ...continue reading "Chart of the day: Inflation in March"