The author is Philip K. Howard and the subtitle is How to Revive the Spirit of America.  The book is short, to the point, in the “abundance + state capacity” genre.  Excerpt, noting I will not double indent: “Three major changes…

A paper (Nov. 2024) (first version Oct. 2024): Downloadable data used in the paper here [xlsx]. This paper is a rebuttal to this article (paper on different server, in case article disappears from original site). Key graph from their paper: .…

We find that decreases in Michelin stars improve consumer review ratings…The analysis of review content further shows that a loss in Michelin stars leads consumers to become less focused on value and become less demanding regarding service. Here is the paper. …

1. Bells ringing before Vespers. 2. Sensible comments on AI. 3. At least thirty-three crypto kidnappings this year? 4. University presidents arguing with each other. 5. Some reasons why DC has been getting worse, of course add Work from Home (which…

From CNN today: “Until it is corrected, the BLS should suspend issuing the monthly job reports but keep publishing the more accurate, though less timely, quarterly data,” he told Fox Business. “Major decision-makers from Wall Street to D.C. rely on these…

by Calculated Risk on 8/12/2025 02:13:00 PM The Cleveland Fed released the median CPI and the trimmed-mean CPI.According to the Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland, the median Consumer Price Index rose 0.3% in July. The 16% trimmed-mean Consumer Price Index increased…

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The F-35 fighter jet is the most expensive weapons program in U.S. history, but one of its biggest failures isn’t in the air — it’s on the ground. The Pentagon’s Autonomic Logistics Information System (ALIS), conceived as an ambitious plan to…

From the CPI release today: Figure 1: CPI all urban (bold blue), CPI – household furnishings and operations (tan), CPI – final demand, consumer durables (green), all in logs 2025M01=0. Source: BLS via FRED, author’s calculations. While m/m CPI headline growth…

by Calculated Risk on 8/12/2025 12:03:00 PM The BLS reported earlier today: The Consumer Price Index for Urban Wage Earners and Clerical Workers (CPI-W) increased 2.5 percent over the last 12 months to an index level of 316.349 (1982-84=100). For the…

Done with Liberty Fund, I very much enjoyed chatting with him.  Here is the link.  Here is their episode summary: Tyler Cowen joins Mitch Daniels to explore AI’s promise, economic threats from debt and regulation, and the need for bold, intelligent…

Yves here. The horrors of Israel’s genocide in Gaza become more intense and wide-ranging as the pace of its extermination accelerates. Israel is also stepping up its ethnic cleansing in the West Bank. It is attacking Southern Lebanon as the Lebanese…

by Calculated Risk on 8/12/2025 08:51:00 AM Here are a few measures of inflation:The first graph is the one Fed Chair Powell had mentioned two years ago as something to watch.  Click on graph for larger image.This graph shows the YoY price…

by Calculated Risk on 8/12/2025 08:30:00 AM From the BLS: The Consumer Price Index for All Urban Consumers (CPI-U) increased 0.2 percent on a seasonally adjusted basis in July, after rising 0.3 percent in June, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics…

Jellyfish force French reactor shutdowns, strain grid Euractiv So bad they’re good – why do we love terrible films? BBC (Robin K) Learning Greek – A Practical Guide Spengler (Micael T) #COVID-19/Pandemics Measles Cases by State in 2025 Visual Capitalist The…

The Trump administration’s latest escalatory threat comes just days after Rolling Stone reported on a secret drug trafficking cartel operating out of Fort Bragg.  Picture this scenario: Mexico’s government is grappling with an institutional crisis. Lawlessness is on the rise as…

Yves here. This VoxEU column, originally titled Recent patterns in global risk behaviour in financial markets, seeks to measure a “safe-haven factor” for the dollar and ascertain how it has operated over time and since Trump’s “Liberation Day” tariff shock and…

A common theme in the vast literature on climate change is the estimation of models using historical data to make predictions many decades into the future. Although there is a large and growing number of these types of studies, researchers rarely…