18 March 2024

California - land of the most successful capitalists in the history of the world

At today's market close, the 50 most valuable companies around the world had a combined market cap of $27.9 trillion.

Portion of total from companies founded in
  • the US: 89% ($24.8 trillion)
  • the West Coast: 64% ($17.7 trillion)
  • California: 44% ($12.3 trillion)
  • California's Bay Area: 43% ($11.9 trillion)

One of the weirder things about the Republican Party is how they've convinced their base that California is the land of socialists when it is so demonstrably the land of the most successful capitalists in the history of the world.

15 March 2024

The Stark and Persistent Labor Market Difference Between Democratic and Republican Presidencies

Those of you who find this kind of thing interesting might find this fascinating.

What is good? A negative number. It shows that the unemployment rate dropped during that presidency.
What is bad? A positive number. It shows that the unemployment rate rose during that presidency.

Red bars indicate a Republican presidency.
Blue bars indicate a Democratic presidency.

There is a stark and persistent difference.

These are not random. Post-FDR, Democratic presidencies have made labor markets a priority when making policy. Republicans continue to make capital markets their priority.


13 March 2024

4 Year Anniversary of COVID in the USA - and how deadly it was to be an American during the pandemic

4 years ago today ...

President Trump declared a national emergency in response to coronavirus on March 13, 2020, to provide emergency funding of up to $50 billion to state and local governments. (The US ended up spending $1.6 trillion on the COVID response in 2020. So, slightly more than first estimated.)

10 months later, 25,000 Americans a week were dying. About 1.2 million Americans have died of COVID.

Trump never did take responsibility for responding to COVID, insisting that states manage the response to this global pandemic.

The US death rate was awful in comparison to other countries. As of February 2022, Canada had fewer than 1,000 COVID-19 related deaths per million people, with a total of 919 deaths per million. Japan was noted for having the fewest deaths and infections among the G10 countries, with 156 deaths per million, despite having the oldest population and imposing the mildest restrictions. The United States had a significantly higher rate, with 2,750 deaths per million, which was the highest among the mentioned countries.

So, to repeat, per million death rate from COVID
Japan - 156
Canada - 919
US - 2,750

Which is to say, Americans died from COVID at 3X the rate as Canadians and at 18X the rate as the Japanese. It was pretty deadly to be an American during the pandemic.

06 March 2024

Trump Refers to the US as a Third-World Country - Unclear if That's a Campaign Promise or Threat

Trump is the first president to use the words bleed, carnage, stolen, tombstones, and trapped in an inaugural address, a man who tried to overthrow democracy to stay in office after losing outside of the former confederacy by more than 10 million votes. This week he referred to the US as a third world country and made it clear that he doesn't want any Republicans in the party who had supported apostates like Romney or Liz Cheney, people who failed to treat him with all the reverence accorded to Jim Jones. (Trump famously does not drink alcohol. He prefers to serve Kool-Aid.)

Republicans get all excited by that sort of talk - still recovering as they are from the trauma of the "great doubling of egg prices in 2023."

04 March 2024

One Reason a Nation Might Turn to a Tyrant

A simple - possibly flawed - explanation for Trump's appeal: when people are frustrated with institutions they turn to a tyrant to blow up the bureaucracy.
People who don't know any history might actually fall for that offer and think that trading sclerotic bureaucracies for an unchecked despot is a good trade. It never is.



01 March 2024

Another Sign the Job Market is Cooling: Wage Hike for Job Switching Has Dropped From Its All-Time High

On average, you get a wage hike for switching jobs. August of 2022, though, offered by the far largest premium for switching jobs, an average of 2.8% bigger raise than if you'd stayed in the same job. These last couple of months, though, that premium has returned to normal, suggesting that the job market is cooling.



28 February 2024

Real GDP Growth Highest in 18 years

Real GDP growth in 2023 was 3.1%.
The three years with highest real GDP growth in the last 19 years:
2021: 5.8%
2005: 3.5%
2023: 3.1%

In simpler terms, GDP growth over the last few years - adjusted for inflation - is the best it's been in decades.




data:
https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/GDPC1?fbclid=IwAR0d2FTpi3tD7B1iI5VyVVj5dutShzylWtweN5KLsx54QO7K5_2Umj6aoVg#0


23 February 2024

26 US Counties with Highest Wages - Silicon Valley Continues to Dominate

Silicon Valley wages continue to be the highest in the country, the only 3 counties where wages average more than twice what they average across the whole country.

Raw data:
https://www.bls.gov/news.release/cewqtr.t01.htm



21 February 2024

A Market Economy - Or What It Will Be Like When the Price of Lunch Bounces Around Like Stock Prices - Wendy's Adopts Dynamic Pricing

This amuses me far more than it should.

Everyday - all day - stock prices bounce up and down. I've wondered how long it'll be before all prices behave like that. Now Wendy's is adopting "dynamic pricing," creating a world where the price of lunch combos do indeed bounce around during the day, depending on fluctuations in supply and demand.




Imagine an exasperated guy telling his partner, "Look at that! You had to visit the bathroom first. And then you had to let that lady with the kids cut in front of us. And now! Now french fries have gone up a dollar. Way to go Stephanie."

"Well, we could just sit here until prices drop again."
"What? For a dollar an hour?"

My cousin in Montana just had a bull sale. Those are auctions and maybe that's what the restaurants will try next. Hordes of hungry office workers and school kids bidding on the price of ramen or burgers like traders in the pits from the 1990s.



"I hear $9.99, $9.99 ... oop! $10.99 to the kid in the hoodie... $10.99 ... going once ... twice ... Sold!"

A market economy.

20 February 2024

Invented Word of the Day: Petipreneur

I'm coining a few words today.

Petipreneur, noun. A person who engages in small acts of entrepreneurship that result in new routines, practices, or relationships that have the potential to spread or outlast them.

Petipreneurship, verb. A small act of inspiring or creating a new group, practice, or shared value. Less about creating an institution (which is better described as entrepreneurship) than about changing some portion of it or daily life.

Petipreneurial, adjective. A person who tends to create new practices, social norms and relationships.

Let me know if you have occasion to use it in conversation. Or even better, practice it.