This Thursday 4:30 CT at UW:
Nick Lardy on China’s Rise and Economic Conflict with the US
6 Replies
Author Archives: Menzie Chinn
CatholicVote: “Two economists reported that after adjusting government statistics to more accurately measure inflation, it became clear that the country has been in a recession for the past two years under the Biden-Harris administration”
That’s the title of this article.
Has GDP Growth Been Faster under Biden vs. than under Trump? Answer: Yes
I keep on hearing people like House Speaker Mike Johnson saying how growth under Trump was the fastest. Well, just comparing against the last three and a half years, I wonder how this can be true. Using the latest available BEA data:
Federal Interest Payments: To the Public vs. To the Rest-of-Federal Government
Ode to an EJ Antoni graph (apologies to Keats). Total interest payments have risen substantially, and this shows up in a scary picture:
The Gutting of the US Dollar, According to Vladimir Putin
From EJ Antoni and Peter St. Onge channel Vladimir Putin (Feb 2024):
America’s political establishment has less respect for the U.S. dollar than our foreign adversaries.
That was made clear when Tucker Carlson recently interviewed the Russian strongman President Vladimir Putin, who clearly articulated how the uniparty in Washington is destroying America’s greatest strategic and economic asset — her currency.
Dollar Demise Predicted
Joe Biden is dethroning King Dollar in real time. The US dollar’s financial dominance is under siege from a uniquely bad combination of foreign and domestic policies, and Americans should be deeply concerned by the fallout if the dollar loses its 80-year reign as the world’s reserve currency.
It’s Almost as If Some People Were Rooting for Recession (Part 2)
EJ Antoni (Heritage) is dubious about GDPNow’s (and other nowcasts) regarding Q3 growth. From X aka Twitter today:
Eric Hovde: In Recession (and Recession Forecast from Dec 2023) [updated]
Video today.
Wisconsin Economic Sit-Rep
DWD released employment numbers for September today.
Has American Economic Output Been in Decline since 2022?
This is the premise of a new paper by Peter St. Onge and EJ Antoni. I have been trying to find a deflator that can yield that the result that US GDP in 2024Q2 is 2.5% below 2019Q1 levels. Based on their discussion in their paper, as well as a video by Dr. St. Onge, I have tried calculating a consumption deflator that is based on house prices and mortgage rates, using the Big Mac price (which Dr. St. Onge lauds in his video as an alternative to official statistics or PWT data), and fast food prices (specifically, the food away from home/limited services restaurants component of the CPI).