We have weekly gasoline prices through week ending 9/30:
Author Archives: Menzie Chinn
Wisconsin GDP Revised Up (a lot!)
Wisconsin GDP grew at 4.2% SAAR in Q2. The 2023Q4 figure was raised 2.7% by the annual update (the corresponding figure for US GDP was 1.2%).
“It’s almost as if you have no economics training at all…”
With apologies to Kramer’s boss in Seinfeld. From Oren Cass’s “Trump’s Most Misunderstood Policy Proposal: Economists aren’t telling the whole truth about tariffs,” The Atlantic:
Their first mistake is to consider only the costs of tariffs, and not the benefits. Traditionally, an economist assessing a proposed market intervention begins by searching for a market failure, typically an “externality,” in need of correction. Pollution is the quintessential illustration. A factory owner will not consider the widespread harms of dumping pollutants in a river when deciding how much to spend on pollution controls. A policy that forces him to pay for polluting will correct this market failure—colloquially by “making it his problem.” It imposes a cost on the polluter in the pursuit of benefits for everyone else.
Q2 GDP Growth by State
The country is in the black, overall, according to Friday’s release.
“Economists for Harris” vs. “Economists for Trump”
Here’s the letter in support of Harris. Here’s the letter in support of Trump (2020).
ZeroHedge: “Mystery Of Upward GDP Revision Solved”
“You Are All $500 Billion Richer Now According To A Revised Biden Admin Spreadsheet” (9/27/2024). I won’t dissect the non-arguments in the article. I’ll just observe that the GDP annual update has brought the GDP series much more in line with the Philadelphia Fed’s tracking of output, in its Coincident Index.
Main Street Agenda town hall meeting in Milwaukee: Inflation
A Main Street Agenda town hall meeting on inflation to be held Tuesday, Oct. 15, from 6 to 8 p.m. at the Clinton Rose Senior Center, 3045 N. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Drive. Register here.
Misery Index, 2020M12 and 2024M08: 8.0% vs. 6.8%
With latest available data:
Consumer Sentiment and Expectations (Rev’d) in September
Upward revisions for both indices from University of Michigan Survey of Consumers:
Guest Contribution: “What we now know about Jimmy Carter’s presidency”
Today, we present a guest post written by Jeffrey Frankel, Harpel Professor at Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government, and formerly a member of the White House Council of Economic Advisers. An earlier version appeared at Project Syndicate.