Tag: inflation

Tucker and Shorties vs Evil

Inspirational Story of the Day: Teen disappointed that he didn’t make the soccer team, so he loses 60 pounds and deadlifts 308 pounds. There are lots of things you can do if you want to badly enough.

Um, Yeah: I can see where meeting a co-worker in such a place might be bothersome. Just say “but it’s the Wall Street Journal! I thought it was business news!” if you get caught reading that at work.

Hi-Ho Silver! Away!: Now might be a good time to sell?

That’s a Good Point: Charity and God may go well together, but not always.

What Would Your Doctor Do?: Say no to nudie-scanners.

Let’s just put all this economic news in one spot: First, we’ve got payroll numbers, which are “rising” but at too slow a pace. Campaign for America’s Future reminds us that “it’s the economy, stupid” and “Americans want government to play a larger role in economic recovery.” Because big business doesn’t give a damn; after all there’s an entire rest of the world to exploit. Tiger Beatdown has a nice item on the ongoing class war that nobody [wealthy] wants to talk about. Meanwhile, more and more families are feeding their families with help from food stamps. Inflation is going to make things even worse for those of us who aren’t millionaires. Tim Iacono points out that the savings rate is even worse that we think. Teen joblessness may reach record levels this summer — which means expect idle teens to find ways to get into trouble. People are defaulting on their student loans. But hey, at least small businesses are borrowing money; maybe they’ll actually hire people.

How interesting: So with gas prices what they are and our nation importing oil, American oil companies are exporting more oil than they sell here! And best of all they are sucking down American tax dollars at the same time!

Even Shutting It is Controversial: Yucca Mountain. I guess some good padlocks aren’t sufficient, eh?

Fortune is Right: What good is a consumer protection agency that can’t protect? If Congress waters down consumer protections, or Elizabeth Warren doesn’t get to head the CFPB, you will know that our lawmakers have sold our souls to the banksters that ripped us off.

Susan’s Got a Point: It is called “special education” for a reason.

Eric Holder’s Vow is Worthless: Back in 2009 he vowed to stop raids on medical marijuana facilities (yeah, I’m no HuffPo fan, but the only better link was NYT). But I guess whatever forces really control the War On Drugs Used By Poor And/Or Brown People told him how stuff is: his office has warned states that they will prosecute anyone they think they can prosecute for medical marijuana. Never mind what the people think. Their opinion only counts on election day, after all.

The More Things Change, the More They Stay the Same: Marie Osmond celebrated her wedding to her third husband… who just happened to have been her first husband. She even got to recycle her original wedding gown. Thanks, NutriSystem!

The *New* New Economy is Not Improved

Let me start by pointing out that today alone, the FDIC had takeover teams at 6 — yes, 6 — different banks in 3 different states. I think that Count Von Count would not be happy to keep track of this. Another number that would fail to please the Count but might make Dr. Evil happy, an anticipated one million foreclosures this year. That situation will get uglier before a healthy market can possibly emerge.

But as Expert Ezra points out, the reason people are so unhappy with the economy right now has a lot to do with the fact that corporate profits are up over 5%, the actual number of available jobs is down over 5% just since 2007. And frankly, I am of the opinion that without the economic shell game the government has been playing with the data, you would probably find that the 2001 recession never ended.

So then, with unemployment what it is, nobody should be particularly shocked that retail sales are down, again, and specifically sales of big ticket items are down. Nobody being able to afford goods leads quite understandably to the possibility of deflation — particularly if you can’t find a way to mask housing prices that are down by half in some parts of the country. Meanwhile, the rich get richer and the poor can, well, do whatever it is they do.

Add to this toxic stew two items: a political party that still thinks you can raise revenues by cutting taxes, but that making sure that “the least of these” can afford groceries is a bad thing; and a financial reform bill that the nicest thing anybody can say about it is that it’s better than nothing, probably. The safety net is being cut just as we need it most despite our protests, and our largest banks may still have the power to ruin us all.

Next time, assuming I am not distracted by something shiny or butterflies or kittens, The Latte Economy.

In Closing: Gee, greater blogosphere, thanks for noticing what I thought I was too late to say yesterday!; this could be bad; Senator Ensign should really give up now; I wonder how much; and two dinosaurs for the price of one.

Shorties Todd

Well, “free” does appear in the title: someone is suing FreeCreditReport.com for charging them a monthly fee for credit monitoring in order to get that “free” credit report.

“How can payrolls and the unemployment rate both go down at the same time?“: More than you want to know about how those figures are manipulated and tortured.

Data bears out common sense: Layoffs are often very bad for the companies that make them. Not only are there severance costs and bad morale (duh), it’s harder to hire back good people when market conditions improve.

Speaking of employment: The President is still of the opinion that small business hiring can and must get us out of this recession. Specifically, he said “Government can’t create these businesses, but it can give entrepreneurs the support they need to open their doors, expand, or hire more workers.” And what does he want to do about it? He wants to expand a couple of SBA programs designed to help well established businesses that already have debt. You know what would really help small businesses? Leveling the playing field with large businesses when it comes to taxes. Dave’s point is that only profits get taxed, which benefits large companies rather than small ones; tax cuts benefit big businesses while shafting the government that needs taxes to run. But let’s face it, Joe’s Hardware Shop has no leverage with city hall, but Wal-Mart can threaten to open in the next town over unless it gets tax breaks.

5th Amendment takes a beating: apparently the Obama Administration reserves the right to assassinate Americans overseas with “special permission.”

Makes me wonder why I bother to pay my mortgage: Here’s your real “phantom inventory,” banks refusing to foreclose on homes where the owner is well over a year in arrears. People are paying credit cards ahead of the mortgage now, which makes sense in a way. Financial planners have always said to pay down your high interest rate debts first! And, well, if the mortgage company is unlikely to foreclose, what incentive is there to pay?

Shackleton’s Whiskey: it’s been freed from ice near the south pole, and sent off for analysis and hopefully recreating lost liquor formulas.

Speaking of drinking: did you know that a 7-11 Double gulp is twice the size of what your stomach should reasonably be able to hold? And, at 64 oz, it’s the equivalent of 8 servings of soda.

And speaking of serving sizes: the FDA wants to crack down on misleading serving sizes on nutrition labels. You know, the ones that say a bowl of cereal is 2 servings, or 6 chips is a serving?

Glad to see someone holding the banks accountable: Cuomo has filed a lawsuit against B of A and several of it’s executives, charging that they hid information from shareholders and lied to the Feds to get bailout money.

And last but not least: a lesson about inflation.

Stay warm and dry, wherever you are.