Free Republic

With inflation easing, the wages of working-class Americans are finally moving into the plus column. Average hourly pay for production and nonsupervisory workers — who make up four-fifths of employees — hit $30.27 in August, according to the latest report from the Bureau of Labor Statistics. According to my organization’s analysis, working-class Americans’ wages, adjusted for inflation, have just edged higher than they were on Election Day, 2020. The average working-class American can now answer “Yes” to the question, “Are you better off now than you were under Donald Trump?” That’s obviously important for political symbolism. But the milestone for...

Former President Donald Trump’s lead over Vice President Kamala Harris is growing among independents, according to a survey from the Economist/YouGov. As is consistent with a survey from the previous week, this poll showed Harris leading Trump, overall, by two percentage points, 47 percent to Trump’s 45 percent. However, one thing that did not remain exactly the same this time around is Trump’s lead among independents, as it is now growing — a trend that has been a long time coming.

The presidential debate was awful for Joe Biden, but the cover-up has been worse. It was agony to watch a befuddled old man struggling to recall words and facts. His inability to land an argument against a weak opponent was dispiriting. But the operation by his campaign to deny what tens of millions of Americans saw with their own eyes is more toxic than either, because its dishonesty provokes contempt.

A recent analysis conducted by The Economist suggests The New York Time’s bestseller list is politically biased against conservatives, a point many on the right have long argued. Books released by conservative publishers are, on average, 7 percent less likely to make it onto the paper’s weekly bestseller list, even if the books sell at a comparable rate to work released from other publishers, the analysis found. While big names on the right don’t face as much of a challenge getting on the list, lesser known authors that are right of center do, The Economist notes. Books that are not...

Jared Bernstein is perhaps the most influential "economist" in the United States. I put economist in quotes, despite his being an academic who has taught the subject and has advised Congress and the highest elected officials in America. I do so because he is a moron. He is such a moron that Paul Krugman himself admires him for his economic insights. He is that bad. ... This is absolutely priceless. And probably the most frightening clip you'll ever watch on the people in charge of the US economy. Jared Bernstein is literally the Chair of the Council of Economic Advisers,...

Nobel Prize winner Robert Aumann commented on the issue of the hostages at the Arutz Sheva - Israel National News Jerusalem Conference. “Consider the ultimatum game,” Professor Aumann began, referencing a known economics problem. “Two players will get ten thousand shekels if they can agree on how to divide it. One suggests splitting it evenly. The other The other insists on taking at least nine thousand shekels. The first player will realize that even though such a demand is irrational, he will still profit by agreeing, and so the rational first player will agree to the terms set by the...

The Economist magazine warns this week of the “growing peril” of a national conservatism that is spreading like wildfire around the planet. National conservatism is “dangerous and it’s spreading,” The Economist intones forebodingly in this week’s cover story. “Liberals need to find a way to stop it.” The cover features a red MAGA cap stretched vertically to fit a slew of nations following the lead of American populism: “Make America, Hungary, Italy, France, Israel, Germany, the Netherlands, Poland great again.” Image Today, Donald Trump, Viktor Orban, and “a motley crew of Western politicians” have constructed “a statist, ‘anti-woke’ conservatism that...

Cover artwork from our 2012 Christmas double issue (The Economist magazine)

We know that antisemitism is out of control on college campuses, and we just had three university presidents testify that calling for genocide isn't a violation of the code of conduct … it depends on the context, like if a student were to actually start killing Jews. That might be taking it a bit too far. But if you misgender someone on campus, that's "abuse." We've often asked where these college-age kids developed such a deep antisemitism. We doubt it was from their parents. Is it all indoctrination by university professors? Or is it because they get their news from...

Ya' gotta love it when so-called Economists tell Americans not to believe their lying eyes and accept that no no, they really ARE better off under Biden's crap economy. Forget that groceries are through the roof, gas is still more expensive than it was when Joe took office, and interest rates on homes for people with EXCELLENT credit is at least 8% ... no no, things are GREAT. Awesome possum. So awesome, per Claudia Sahm, that when she insisted Americans are better off she hid replies and THEN deleted her post. Why would Claudia delete this tweet? She worked so...

Bank of America’s chief economist warned on Sunday that 2023 would be a “difficult” one for Americans due to economic factors that he predicted could trigger a recession. When asked by CBS’ Margaret Brennan on “Face the Nation” to give a forecast on the economy this year, Michael Gapen said he agreed with the notion that it could look and feel worse.

The US housing market remains in “free fall” after a survey showed a “disastrous” decline in homebuilder confidence, a prominent economist warned on Tuesday. Homebuilder confidence plunged for the 10th consecutive month in October, falling to its lowest level since 2012, according to the National Association of Home Builders’ monthly survey. The latest downtick came as mortgage rates spiked to levels not seen since the Great Recession. The survey’s results were “disastrous” and indicated there is “no bottom yet” for the housing market’s current slump, according to Ian Shepherdson, chief economist at Pantheon Macroeconomics. “The plunge in the NAHB index...

The investigation by Senate Republicans found that the decadelong effort included detaining a Fed economist in China.. China tried to build a network of informants inside the Federal Reserve system, at one point threatening to imprison a Fed economist during a trip to Shanghai unless he agreed to provide nonpublic economic data, a congressional investigation found. The investigation by Republican staff members of the Senate’s Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs found that over a decade Fed employees were offered contracts with Chinese talent recruitment programs, which often include cash payments, and asked to provide information on the U.S....

Harvard University economics professor Kenneth Rogoff warned on Friday that it will be "really hard" to get the "inflation rate down" without causing a recession. If [the Fed] have to raise interest rates that much, it will cause a recession, no doubt," Rogoff told "Cavuto: Coast to Coast." "I don't think they'll go that far. My best guess is they fall short. They raise interest rates to 3-3.5, and we're left with a very soft economy and still inflation."

WHEN VLADIMIR PUTIN ordered Russian troops into Ukraine he was not alone in thinking victory would be swift. Many Western analysts also expected Kyiv, the capital, to fall within 72 hours. Ukrainian valour and ingenuity confounded those assumptions. As the war enters its sixth week, the side that is contemplating victory is not Russia but Ukraine—and it would be a victory that redraws the map of European security. Speaking to The Economist in Kyiv on March 25th, President Volodymyr Zelensky explained how people power is the secret to Ukraine’s resistance and why the war is shifting in his nation’s favour....

The chief economic adviser for financial services firm Allianz warned that the new coronavirus variant Omicron could shake up the markets, exacerbate supply chain woes, amplify record-high inflation pressures — and possibly result in 1970s-style “stagflation.” Economist Mohamed El-Erian was asked by “Fox News Sunday” host Trace Gallagher about the Dow tumbling 900 points on Friday over fears of the new variant and market uncertainty over the possibility of more lockdowns and travel bans.

A Harvard economist has said that the high rate of inflation currently plaguing the United States has positioned the economy on a “knife edge,” and it’s difficult to see how the Fed’s indecisive wait-and-see stance will bring it back on track.Kenneth Rogoff said on Fox Business’s “Mornings with Maria” that the recovery is “still pretty good, but we certainly have inflation which is almost eye-popping, over 6 percent.” While the core inflation is lower, he said, these are “stunning numbers from just a few years ago.”The Fed, meanwhile, claims that the inflation is temporary, but Rogoff said that if the...

Claim: “There’s nobody suggesting there’s unchecked inflation is on the way. No serious economist,” President Joe Biden said on Monday. Larry Summers is worried about inflation. He has been the Treasury Secretary under Bill Clinton, director of the National Economic Council under Barack Obama, chief economist of the World Bank, and president of Harvard University. He is one of the most prominent economists in the United States today. Summers has been warning that the Biden administration’s policies risked inflation and overheating several months ago, a topic he returned to on Twitter last week.

Top Biden Economic Policy Adviser Linked to Kashmiri Extremists By J. M. Phelps Islamist Watch meforum.org and American Spectator https://spectator.org/sameera-fazili-biden-adviser-kashmir-extremists/ March 5, 2021 [Caption] On February 24, Sameera Fazili, deputy director of the National Economic Council, became the first Muslim American woman to hold a White House press briefing. Promising to put together one of the most diverse cabinets in American history, President Joe Biden has appointed at least 20 Indian-Americans to various positions within his administration, including the first two women of Kashmiri descent. Alarmingly, one of his latest picks to the National Economic Council (NEC) has a history...

Dr. Anthony Fauci cast doubts Tuesday on whether life would be back to normal by March 2022 as the coronavirus pandemic continues. “I don’t think we’re going to be completely normal a year from now,” Fauci said. “But I hope we’re well on the way to normality so that we can ultimately get the world protected at the same time as we get economic recovery so that all the unintended consequences of shutting down begin to normalize, including other health issues that have arisen because of the shutdown.”