The Curious Engineer

Kevin Drum

2022

1,351 posts

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2022 1,351

December 2022

  1. Top ten good political news of 2022
  2. A very special weekend lunchtime photo
  3. Top ten charts of 2022
  4. Top ten photos of 2022
  5. There is no worker revolt
  6. Let’s talk about the real problems with rural America
  7. Friday Cat Blogging – 30 December 2022
  8. What’s in Donald Trump’s tax returns?
  9. Yet another look at that lead-crime meta-study
  10. Lunchtime Photo
  11. TikTok offers to let US agencies oversee content moderation
  12. Tesla is just a car company
  13. The Fed’s future is barreling toward us
  14. Lunchtime Photo
  15. For New Year’s, the price of gasoline dropped yet again
  16. Lunchtime Photo
  17. News you can use: How to handle numbers like a true nerd
  18. What’s it like to have $1 million, Dr. Evil?
  19. What’s behind China’s about-face on COVID?
  20. Lunchtime Photo
  21. “What does woke mean, anyway?”
  22. FTX wasn’t the first big crypto implosion this year
  23. The real cruelty of migrant busing is right on the surface
  24. Google search trends for 2022
  25. Including the cats
  26. Merry Christmas to all
  27. It’s Christmas Eve in Southern California
  28. Global supply chains have recovered for the holidays
  29. If I am not an American, what am I?
  30. Consumer spending has been pretty steady all year
  31. Friday Cat Blogging – 23 December 2022
  32. How long does it take interest rates to affect inflation? About a year or so.
  33. Inflation has practically disappeared
  34. Donald Trump really hates giving money to charity
  35. Raw data: COVID death rates in 2022
  36. Lunchtime Photo
  37. Los Angeles sure has improved its high school graduation rate
  38. Quote of the day: Tracking the private jets of zillionaires
  39. It’s all over for Sam Bankman-Fried
  40. I give the United States a B+ over the past two years
  41. Lunchtime Photo
  42. Uncle Sam is coming for Mickey Mouse
  43. Consumers still think a recession is coming
  44. Language changes. Deal with it.
  45. Donald Trump paid no taxes because he never made any money
  46. Health Update
  47. Lunchtime Photo
  48. Raw data: Single family starts were down 4% in November
  49. Here’s why fentanyl took until 2013 to become popular
  50. House votes today on releasing Trump’s tax returns. They shouldn’t.
  51. The past two years show that illegal immigration isn’t a very big problem
  52. Why did it take so long for fentanyl to become popular?
  53. Lunchtime Photo
  54. Canadian cow update
  55. Oil trades put US $4 billion ahead this year
  56. Crypto assets fall 14.5% in November
  57. Black men and the California State Bar
  58. Driverless cars don’t work yet. So what?
  59. Let us ponder Gov. Doug Ducey’s jerry-built border wall
  60. Friday Cat Blogging – 16 December 2022
  61. Raw data: Occupational fatalities in 2021
  62. The price of gasoline keeps going down
  63. Lunchtime Photo
  64. You don’t have to know anything to know that crypto is a scam
  65. Should we be masking students in K12 schools?
  66. It’s time to change our minds about the cause of our current bout of inflation
  67. Chart of the day: Retail and food service sales for November
  68. There is (still) no reason to panic about our schools
  69. Elon’s jet: A drama in three or four acts
  70. Lunchtime Photo
  71. The race to out-Trump Trump is on
  72. A few weird musings about California and Elon Musk
  73. Who killed Princess Diana?
  74. What’s up with rent inflation?
  75. Lunchtime Photo
  76. SBF made off with about $3 billion from the collapse of FTX
  77. Weekly earnings were up slightly in November
  78. Inflation dropped like a stone in November
  79. The lame duck session of Congress is nearly over
  80. Warning: The NIF fusion facility didn’t really produce a net energy gain
  81. Lunchtime Photo
  82. Raw data: The M2 money supply
  83. The real Twitter is not left or right
  84. The Twitter Files, Parts 2 – infinity
  85. New study says Black drivers get 0.7 more speeding citations per century
  86. Bitcoin goes up. Bitcoin goes down. Right now it’s down.
  87. Friday Cat Blogging – 9 December 2022
  88. Apple fires senior executive over ill-considered joke
  89. It’s time to turn the tables and investigate Republicans
  90. Producer price inflation remains solidly under control in November
  91. Kyrsten Sinema decides she doesn’t want to be a Democrat any more.
  92. The labor market is slowing down
  93. Same-sex marriage is finally safe. I hope.
  94. Lunchtime Photo
  95. Was it right to swap Brittney Griner (innocent basketball player) for Viktor Bout (guilty arms dealer)?
  96. Raw data: Child maltreatment in the United States
  97. Great bloggers are rare, weird, and not team players
  98. How do you solve a problem like Facebook?
  99. Gasoline is so, so cheap right now
  100. Mars is occulted but survives
  101. Our skyrocketing pedestrian death rate remains a mystery. Maybe.
  102. A quick Wednesday roundup
  103. Lunchtime Photo
  104. General Announcement
  105. ChatGPT is coming for your job. And I do mean your.
  106. Happy Tuesday!
  107. How much does a one-bedroom apartment on the East Side cost?
  108. Lunchtime Photo
  109. We are slowly calming down on airline flights
  110. We all miss Socks, don’t we?
  111. Free speech is all but dead . . . in India
  112. James Baker, shadowy puppetmaster for the liberal Deep State
  113. How many new housing units do we need?
  114. Lunchtime Photo
  115. Here’s the truth about drug shortages
  116. How is free speech faring in America?
  117. Artificial intelligence isn’t here yet, but it’s getting damn close
  118. Are wages declining too slowly?
  119. Why are there— Wait. Does lead really cause more crime?
  120. Here’s the story of Twitter, Elon Musk, Matt Taibbi, and the Hunter Biden laptop
  121. The best films of each decade
  122. Mirror, mirror, who’s the best director of them all?
  123. How many new jobs have we created this year?
  124. Congratulations Utes
  125. Friday Cat Blogging – 2 December 2022
  126. Here’s a midterm report on remote work
  127. Welcome to the magentaverse
  128. Chart of the day: Net new jobs in November
  129. A very brief FTX/SBF explainer
  130. Lunchtime Photo
  131. France is not happy about growing American nationalism
  132. In October, income was up but spending was up even more
  133. Core PCE inflation plummets to 2.7% in October
  134. Raw data: Gasoline prices are lower than a year ago
  135. Surprise! Apple never planned to kick Twitter out of the App Store

November 2022

  1. Lunchtime Photo
  2. Core inflation in the Euro area is dropping steadily
  3. Who’s got the best argument in the railroad talks?
  4. Raw data: The US murder rate over the past decade
  5. My review of the Microsoft Surface Pro 9, ARM version
  6. Lunchtime Photo
  7. Two recessions are barreling toward us next year
  8. Raw data: Traffic fatalities in rural and urban areas
  9. Lunchtime Photo
  10. Update: The House popular vote in 2022
  11. Let’s please cut the crap on LA homelessness
  12. Here’s why I will never buy an HP printer again (this time for sure)
  13. About those Fed rate hikes . . .
  14. The great question of our day: Block or mute?
  15. Multiple myeloma: Not just for us commoners anymore
  16. Health update
  17. Conservatives have safe spaces too
  18. Donald Trump continues his downward spiral to hell
  19. Friday Cat Blogging – 25 November 2022
  20. Raw data: Why America thinks violent crime is up even though it isn’t
  21. Lunchtime Photo
  22. One turkey’s terrorist is another turkey’s freedom fighter
  23. Happy Thanksgiving?
  24. The curious case of the decline and fall of “internet”
  25. Raw data: What popular obscenity has grown the most?
  26. The White House needs a copy editor
  27. Lunchtime Photo
  28. A few trillion dollars is plenty big enough to be regulated
  29. Another look at Millennial vs. Boomer retirement
  30. Lunchtime Photo
  31. Raw data: police shootings of unarmed suspects are way down
  32. Violent crime has plummeted since Election Day!
  33. Millennial wealth is suddenly looking very normal
  34. Lunchtime Photo
  35. Here’s a deep dive into the Hunter Biden laptop scandal
  36. China may be getting close to COVID-19 meltdown
  37. Ed Sheeran?
  38. Elon Musk has— oh forget it
  39. Sweden continues to look pretty good on COVID-19
  40. Is it worth another round on the mythical teacher crisis?
  41. Friday Dog Blogging – 18 November 2022
  42. Raw data: Total factor productivity was up in 2021
  43. Official shitlist results finally in
  44. Lunchtime Photo
  45. Nancy Pelosi steps down as Speaker
  46. Inflation is melting away
  47. Lunchtime Photo
  48. Lunchtime Photo
  49. Raw data: Unicorns with the biggest losses
  50. Did vaccine denial play a role in Republican midterm losses?
  51. This is the world’s greatest Kari Lake takedown
  52. There are now 8 billion people in the world
  53. Businesses hate E-Verify. Should Ron DeSantis try to pass it anyway?
  54. Lunchtime Photo
  55. Seeing the political forest, not just the trees
  56. Today’s deep economic analysis
  57. Shitlist Update
  58. Surprise! Democrats didn’t do well in 2022.
  59. Democrats keep control of the Senate
  60. Friday Cat Blogging – 11 November 2022
  61. Kristallnacht turns out to be a bad excuse for eating at KFC
  62. Student loan forgiveness program yet again in hot water
  63. Should Democrats loosen up some on anti-racism?
  64. Lunchtime Photo
  65. Friends don’t let friends rely on exit polls
  66. I predict that Kari Lake will lose in Arizona
  67. Betting markets lost big on Tuesday
  68. Youth turnout this year definitely wasn’t up. But it might not have been down either.
  69. Democrats inch toward winning the Senate. Republicans inch toward losing the House.*
  70. Core CPI, the number to care about, plummeted this month
  71. Where is Kherson, precisely?
  72. Georgia! It’s Georgia again.
  73. Lunchtime Photo
  74. Battery storage for electric power is skyrocketing in California
  75. A brief history of Twitter’s infamous blue check
  76. We are nowhere close to knowing who will be mayor of Los Angeles
  77. Democrats pull out a squeaker
  78. Here’s what I’m watching for tonight
  79. Lunchtime Photo
  80. Department of Justice not welcome in red states
  81. Leverage is back and it might get worse
  82. Vote
  83. Is debt really up all over the place?
  84. Lunchtime Photo
  85. Why do liberals hate America so badly that they want to destroy it?
  86. Once again, the Wall Street Journal deliberately misleads its readers
  87. Here’s how to vote on California’s ballot initiatives
  88. Biden’s computer chip ban on China is a big deal
  89. Telescope update
  90. Here’s the latest pandemic update
  91. Seth Masket is bored of threadbare political narratives. He shouldn’t be.
  92. Childhood immunizations have cratered in Florida
  93. The free market says a college quarterback is worth $8 million
  94. The job market is s-l-o-w-i-n-g d-o-w-n
  95. Was James Bennet really right?
  96. Violent crime is under control in big cities — with one big exception
  97. Violent crime in Philadelphia is up . . . slightly
  98. Friday Cat Blogging – 4 November 2022
  99. Chart of the day: Net new jobs in October
  100. Gavin Newsom wants action on homelessness, but he needs help
  101. Crime is up in New York City, but how much?
  102. Lunchtime Photo
  103. Corporate markups, take 2
  104. Inflation will soon be under control, and it has nothing to do with the Fed
  105. We have quantified the madness of reward cards
  106. “Right Turn on Red” is California’s gift to the nation
  107. Lunchtime Photo
  108. Please stop obsessing about Elon Musk
  109. It’s Groundhog Day in Washington DC
  110. The rental market has cooled down to almost normal
  111. Corporations are marking up their products way beyond the inflation rate
  112. Lunchtime Photo
  113. The feds are fighting election disinformation, and that’s fine
  114. Raw data: Savings are high, but spending is normal
  115. Trump’s tax records delayed yet again
  116. Are American workers suddenly getting lazy?

October 2022

  1. The MAGA right takes repulsive behavior to whole new levels over Paul Pelosi
  2. Lunchtime Photo
  3. Just how effective is affirmative action, anyway?
  4. The Brazilian Donald Trump lost reelection tonight
  5. What was the big emergency in Wuhan all about?
  6. Friday Cat Blogging – 28 October 2022
  7. We live in the age of MAGA violence
  8. Average monthly mortgages have increased 71% since last year (so far)
  9. Worker comp is down. Corporate profits are up. Imagine that.
  10. Personal income was flat in September
  11. Core PCE inflation dropped to 5.5% in September. Headline inflation came in at 4.1%.
  12. Health update
  13. Climate change is here to stay
  14. Lunchtime Photo
  15. Mortgage rates just keep going up and up
  16. Chart of the day: GDP was up 2.6% last quarter
  17. What have we done for you lately? Here’s a short list.
  18. Lunchtime Photo
  19. Random factoid of the day: Your job is getting safer
  20. Do you have a job?
  21. Raw data: Productivity growth in the United States
  22. Lunchtime Photo
  23. Home prices plunged 16% in August
  24. Raw data: How we get from place to place
  25. “Pink slime journalism” is a Republican thing
  26. Rishi Sunak is sort of mildly well off
  27. Lunchtime Photo
  28. Good news for Europe
  29. Republicans are the anti-democracy party
  30. Here’s my take on California’s ballot initiatives
  31. How badly has the UK suffered from Brexit?
  32. Friday Cat Blogging – 21 October 2022
  33. LA’s racist recording scandal doesn’t seem to faze ordinary residents
  34. Raw data: The federal deficit in 2022
  35. Let’s talk about burnout
  36. Why are Republicans surging as the midterms approach?
  37. Winter is coming
  38. Lunchtime Photo
  39. Raw data: Home price growth
  40. Here’s what fetal tissue looks like at nine weeks
  41. What’s behind the Adderall shortage?
  42. Capitalism worked fine during the pandemic, thanks very much
  43. Maternal mortality in the US just keeps getting worse and worse
  44. Lunchtime Photo
  45. Today is my 64th anniversary
  46. Raw data: Here’s where our drugs come from
  47. Yet another Durham case goes up in flames
  48. Lunchtime Photo
  49. Raw data: Wages for full-time workers
  50. We are awash in new COVID-19 variants
  51. Today is my 8th anniversary
  52. Lunchtime Photo
  53. Is the Biden stimulus responsible for inflation? Or is it remote work?
  54. China’s economy must be worse than we thought
  55. Larry Summers on what needs to be done: “Something somewhere”
  56. Here’s what the American public is thinking these days
  57. Who you calling racist, WaPo?
  58. Incomes are too damn low in Kansas City
  59. SPAC mergers were great for a while—for some people
  60. Friday Cat Blogging – 14 October 2022
  61. Social Security recipients are getting a big raise next year, but is it enough?
  62. Medicaid expansion is about to grind to a halt
  63. Real per-capita retail sales dropped 0.4% in September
  64. Crime
  65. Lunchtime Photo
  66. Wages were down once again in September
  67. September inflation remains stubbornly elevated
  68. Raw data: Men and women after the pandemic
  69. Donald Trump is careening down a rabbit hole of legal pain
  70. Do MAGA Republicans live in a state of constant fear?
  71. Dodgers win!
  72. Housing prices continue to fall in Southern California
  73. Lunchtime Photo
  74. Republicans need to look in a mirror more often
  75. The Constitution is . . . yawn . . . under assault again
  76. Core PPI remains low in September
  77. Lunchtime Photo
  78. Why is unemployment lasting so long these days?
  79. Wait. Biden is mad at the Saudis because they sided with Republicans?
  80. Maybe job growth isn’t as great as we think
  81. Lunchtime Photo
  82. “Overwhelmingly white and male”
  83. Raw data: A different way of looking at fear of crime
  84. Charting the pandemic
  85. Yet more prices are already dropping
  86. Friday Cat Blogging – 7 October 2022
  87. Control of the Senate is coming down to four seats
  88. Chart of the day: Net new jobs in September
  89. Raw data: Net oil imports in the United States
  90. The coming end times explain (some of) Donald Trump’s popularity
  91. J.K. Rowling not arrested by Surrey police
  92. Lunchtime Photo
  93. A further look at declining international trade
  94. Lunchtime Photo
  95. Who’s afraid of the national debt?
  96. Black students do a lot worse in STEM programs than white students
  97. World trade will slow sharply next year
  98. We lost a million job openings in August
  99. Lunchtime Photo
  100. 70% of Republicans blame inflation on Joe Biden
  101. What’s causing core inflation?
  102. Lunchtime Photo
  103. BREAKING NEWS: Donald Trump is an idiot
  104. Here’s another look at our national teacher shortage
  105. In California, jaywalking is no longer naywalking
  106. The Supreme Court is now the third branch of the Republican Party
  107. Let’s please cut out the Tyrant Biden nonsense

September 2022

  1. Employment has recovered to pre-pandemic levels almost everywhere
  2. Friday Cat Blogging – 30 September 2022
  3. Eurozone inflation skyrocketed in September
  4. Income and expenditures were up slightly in August
  5. Core PCE inflation jumps higher in August
  6. Mortgage rates just keep going up, up, and up some more
  7. Lunchtime Photo
  8. Time to raise the debt limit by a quadrillion dollars?
  9. Driverless cars: A Rorschach test
  10. How’s the monkeypox epidemic going?
  11. Lunchtime Photo
  12. Far-right wacko politics is losing ground lately
  13. Raw data: We sure like to gripe about flying
  14. I have a question about Tucker Carlson, Nord Stream, internet trunk lines, and the American power grid
  15. A one-day look at some of China’s problems
  16. Here’s why the price of beef has gone up so much
  17. Lunchtime Photo
  18. Eastern Ukraine votes overwhelmingly to show its love for Vladimir Putin
  19. The cost of lumber has plummeted
  20. Texas attorney general is afraid of the long arm of the law
  21. The student loan program will cost . . .
  22. Health Update
  23. Raw data: Net worth of the poor, the middle class, and the rich
  24. Lunchtime Photo
  25. We are now experiencing rent deflation
  26. Is there really a shortage of home health care workers?
  27. Why the fake referendums in Ukraine?
  28. Squirrel photo of the day
  29. “Slouching Towards Utopia”: The actual review itself
  30. The stock market is down even more than you think
  31. Friday Cat Blogging – 23 September 2022
  32. Inflation panic is destroying the world
  33. Late capitalism strikes again
  34. “Slouching Towards Utopia”: A technical preface to an actual review
  35. Raw data: The M2 money supply
  36. Why do people own 7 houses?
  37. Lunchtime Photo
  38. Racial disparities in the criminal justice system are declining steadily
  39. There’s no labor shortage at fast food restaurants
  40. News roundup for Wednesday
  41. Lunchtime Photo
  42. I am now fully vaccinated. Are you?
  43. How much has North American freight increased over the past year?
  44. How much are rent and housing going up?
  45. Lunchtime Photo
  46. The housing market is getting ready to tumble
  47. Election fraud? It’s always Republicans.
  48. Gasoline prices just keep falling and falling
  49. “Have you left no sense of decency?”
  50. Lunchtime Photo
  51. Raw data: Leading causes of death in the United States
  52. Who exactly is outraged by the casting of “Rings of Power”?
  53. Victory! (Over my telescope.)
  54. Stop killing the economy, Jerome!
  55. Annenberg’s annual civics survey is a bunch of hocus pocus
  56. Friday Cat Blogging – 16 September 2022
  57. We really, really don’t need a huge recession
  58. Gasoline was down another nickel last week
  59. In the National Enquirer’s universe, Joe Biden is unhinged and demented
  60. Russian revenues are being hit hard by the war in Ukraine
  61. Lunchtime Photo
  62. Railroad strike averted! All hail President Biden!
  63. Retail sales are once again flat in August
  64. Yet more raw data: 2021 income bonanza
  65. Raw data and lots of it: Inflation trends in various categories of goods and services
  66. Lunchtime Photo
  67. Lunchtime Photo
  68. Here’s how best to look at inflation
  69. Annual incomes were up last year
  70. Inflation in August remained subdued
  71. Raw data: Household net worth
  72. Lunchtime Photo
  73. The world is not a debating club
  74. Raw data: Child poverty, 1986-2019
  75. Here are the freest big countries in the world
  76. Here are the five best lines from today’s dismissal of Donald Trump’s latest idiocy
  77. Friday Cat Blogging – 9 September 2022
  78. Michigan Supreme Court throws out “formatting and spacing” complaint
  79. Let’s analyze Larry Summers
  80. Raw data: What products have recovered best from the pandemic?
  81. Queen Elizabeth II dies, leaving Britain awash in code names
  82. Lunchtime Photo
  83. In 2021, income was down 1% while expenditures were up 4%
  84. Health Update
  85. Lunchtime Photo
  86. Crystal ball update
  87. How far can gasoline drop?
  88. Raw data: The price of natural gas in the US and Europe
  89. Lunchtime Photo
  90. What can a popular personality test teach you?
  91. Why is housing more expensive in LA than Riverside?
  92. The American economy is a model for the rest of the world
  93. Lunchtime Photo
  94. Who wrecked the Republican Party?
  95. The Andromeda Galaxy
  96. Chart of the day: Support for abortion is rising
  97. A tour of my telescope
  98. China’s autocratic ways will eventually doom them
  99. Raw data: Where our memes come from
  100. Friday Cat Blogging – 2 September 2022
  101. The FBI found an awful lot of empty folders marked “Classified” at Mar-a-Lago
  102. Chart of the day: Net new jobs in August
  103. NR editor: Biden has no right to attack Trump
  104. Lunchtime Photo
  105. Democrats continue to make slow progress in congressional balloting
  106. $22 an hour to flip burgers in California? Maybe!
  107. Let’s not panic over fourth-grade test declines during the pandemic. Not yet, anyway.
  108. Fourth graders lost about half a grade level of learning during the pandemic
  109. Our victory in the Cold War is still intact
  110. Sarah Palin loses yet another election
  111. Michigan Republicans refuse to approve abortion initiative just because they don’t feel like it

August 2022

  1. Lunchtime Photo
  2. Unemployment is down everywhere except Indiana
  3. Election momentum is swinging toward Democrats
  4. Health update
  5. Lunchtime Photo
  6. Gasoline prices are down yet again
  7. Lunchtime Photo
  8. FDA critics are finally having an aha moment
  9. Raw data: The price of natural gas
  10. Can we use fusion power to solve California’s drought?
  11. Raw data: Retail profits in a post-pandemic world
  12. New study says American students are improving. Are they?
  13. Here’s the latest on Joe Biden’s approval level
  14. Sorry, but Djokovic doesn’t get a pass
  15. Disease Update
  16. Friday Cat Blogging – 26 August 2022
  17. Raw data: Who benefits from student loan forgiveness?
  18. Texas judge rules Texas gun laws are too damn liberal
  19. PCE inflation rate tumbles below zero in July
  20. Lunchtime Photo
  21. Corporate profits were down slightly in Q2
  22. Here’s how to get the hard-core homeless into homes
  23. Lunchtime Photo
  24. Biden announces $10-20,000 student debt cancellation
  25. Raw data: Core inflation vs. food inflation
  26. Gender neutrality is hardly an invention of the wokeness movement
  27. Lunchtime Photo
  28. How do you decide whose student debt to cancel?
  29. The increase in the office vacancy rate isn’t really a pandemic phenomenon
  30. The price of gasoline went down another nickel last week
  31. The FBI recovered 100 classified documents in its search of Mar-a-Lago this month
  32. It’s my 20th anniversary
  33. Lunchtime Photo
  34. Is effective altruism good? Sure, but . . .
  35. “Quiet quitting” is the latest half-witted workplace meme
  36. Friday Cat Blogging – 19 August 2022
  37. Inflationary pressures are easing
  38. BREAKING NEWS: Blog now working again
  39. Good news!
  40. Lunchtime Photo
  41. Existing home sales drop another 6% in July
  42. Three-quarters of American adults read above a 6th grade level
  43. Lunchtime Photo
  44. Hearing aids are about to get rabbit punched by market capitalism
  45. Are supersonic flights in our future, eventually?
  46. Charts of the day from our nation’s statistical agencies
  47. Lunchtime Photo
  48. We spent 20 years in Afghanistan and it’s supposed to show weakness that we finally got out?
  49. Single-family housing starts are plummeting
  50. Gasoline prices are down again
  51. Why did Donald Trump take all those classified documents?
  52. COVID-19 hardly changed anything
  53. Lunchtime Photo
  54. No, monkeypox is not a repeat of COVID-19
  55. Raw data: The Chinese economy
  56. McManus: Our withdrawal from Afghanistan wasn’t so bad after all
  57. So many arguments
  58. The evolution of the search warrant
  59. The moon’s a balloon
  60. Please stop with the deep dives on the climate bill
  61. Raw data: Rental vacancy rates in large cities
  62. Sure, nuclear secrets, but what kind of nuclear secrets?
  63. Friday Cat Blogging – 12 August 2022
  64. Trump took super-duper-top-secret files from the White House
  65. Raw data: New business formation
  66. Lunchtime Photo
  67. PPI, a leading indicator for consumer inflation, plummeted in July
  68. Raw data: Inflationary episodes over the past 70 years
  69. My bionic eyes: A final report and assessment
  70. Forget price negotiation. There’s more than that for Medicare in the climate change bill.
  71. Lunchtime Photo
  72. Team transitory vs. Team inflation
  73. Chart of the day: Inflation in July
  74. Health update
  75. Lunchtime Photo
  76. Republican hissy fit over FBI search is based on . . . absolutely nothing
  77. A not-so-brief look at productivity and the labor force
  78. The FBI search of Trump’s home probably wasn’t about the 15 boxes
  79. Gasoline prices were down yet again last week
  80. Lunchtime Photo
  81. The new enforcement budget for the IRS is aimed solely at the rich
  82. Was MSNBC a center-right news channel during the Trump years?
  83. Why no body positivity for men?
  84. I am officially urgent
  85. Juvenile crime is down yet again
  86. No, you can’t tell the difference between analog and digital
  87. Has the US economy really been shrinking?
  88. France fights back against Kevin prejudice
  89. Friday Cat Blogging – 5 August 2022
  90. Democrats finally agree on spending bill
  91. Economic mystery of the month
  92. Chart of the day: Net new jobs in July
  93. Lunchtime Photo
  94. What’s the right amount of noise?
  95. Are we facing a catastrophic teacher shortage?
  96. Democrats are gaining ground in the generic congressional polls
  97. Raw data: People without health insurance in the United States
  98. Lunchtime Photo
  99. So how about Boomer rents vs. Millennials?
  100. What’s the matter with Kansas? Nothing!
  101. Most Boomers had higher housing costs than Millennials
  102. Yet more people had their phones wiped after the 1/6 insurrection
  103. Lunchtime Photo
  104. Joe Biden’s greatest accomplishment so far is . . .
  105. Gasoline prices just keep plummeting
  106. Wait! Again. It was really the Senate that played games with the PACT Act
  107. Lunchtime Photo
  108. Front line workers of color are doing pretty well these days

July 2022

  1. Who changed the PACT Act?
  2. Who exactly is sabotaging the PACT Act?
  3. Evictions are returning to near their normal, pre-pandemic levels
  4. Are we in a recession or not? You can decide for yourself!
  5. The crime surge in New York City is beyond belief. Literally.
  6. What’s the best word to describe the Secret Service’s loss of text messages?
  7. Friday Cat Blogging – 29 July 2022
  8. Obamacare gets a boost in the Inflation Reduction Act
  9. Worker pay and benefits are falling
  10. Inflation is up and income is down. Ugh.
  11. Lunchtime Photo
  12. GDP shrinks 0.9% in the second quarter
  13. How long can the Russian economy hold out amid crippling sanctions?
  14. Stuff is getting done. Is it the start of a trend?
  15. The latest GDP release is barreling toward us tomorrow
  16. Lunchtime Photo
  17. Job gains are going up, up, up
  18. Raw data: The top 20 worst airports in the world
  19. Did Donald Luskin get it right about inflation today?
  20. Raw data: The fastest growing cities in the United States
  21. Lunchtime Photo
  22. Steve Bannon is a creep
  23. In poor neighborhoods, immigrants have the highest life expectancies
  24. How much housing do we need?
  25. Lunchtime Photo
  26. Wait! Is Gen X the real slacker generation?
  27. The Aughts
  28. Is walking out on a speaker no longer allowed?
  29. Raw data: How many people work for the government?
  30. Cat-shaped thing implicated in New York attack
  31. Marriage in the US has been declining since 1949
  32. Friday Cat Blogging – 22 July 2022
  33. Raw data: E-commerce as a share of all retail sales
  34. Bye bye to all robocalls?
  35. Lunchtime Photo
  36. Bye bye to auto warranty scam calls
  37. More Americans should have a heat pump
  38. Is high inflation here to stay? Let’s hear from everybody.
  39. Russia wants a free path to Crimea
  40. I think we all know what the Secret Service did last year
  41. Lunchtime Photo
  42. Why is Merrick Garland holding back on Donald Trump?
  43. Raw data: Weekly wages in Q2 of 2022
  44. Obamacare premiums set to fall 2.3% in California
  45. Lunchtime Photo
  46. Geoengineering is (probably) in our future
  47. Airline CEOs should probably all be fired
  48. Housing prices drop in Southern California for the first time in a decade
  49. Raw data: Hispanic support for the Democratic Party
  50. The price of gasoline was down yet again last week
  51. Why doesn’t the FDA have an MRA with the EMA for GMP on pharmaceuticals?
  52. Raw data: Housing in the US
  53. Lunchtime Photo
  54. The economy is set to improve this year — if we want it to
  55. Raw data: Core inflation in the US and Europe
  56. Everyone is to blame for Uvalde
  57. Raw data: The US dollar is the strongest currency in the world
  58. Does anyone know what’s really going on with monkeypox testing?
  59. Monkeypox vaccine is on its way from Denmark
  60. Friday Cat Blogging – 15 July 2022
  61. Quote of the day: “I’m just a social democrat, man.”
  62. Retail spending was down in June
  63. Yet another geeky look at inflation
  64. New eyes are working fine so far
  65. Lunchtime Photo
  66. Yes, there was good news in the June inflation report
  67. Raw data: Inflation around the world
  68. Hourly earnings were down yet again in June
  69. Lunchtime Photo
  70. Raw data: The price of gasoline is still dropping
  71. Chart of the day: Inflation in June
  72. Health Update
  73. Raw data: Earnings of Gen X vs. Millennials
  74. Lunchtime Photo
  75. California sets up awesome showdown with Supreme Court
  76. Every month we find something new to panic about
  77. NASA unveils Webb images of the Carina Nebula, Stephen’s Quintet, and the Southern Ring planetary nebula
  78. Infrared’s 15 minutes are over
  79. How big a disaster is the FDA’s monkeypox approval delay?
  80. Republicans are souring on Donald Trump
  81. Does automation increase efficiency at container ports?
  82. How much are new rents going up? Not so much!
  83. Lunchtime Photo
  84. Wages are moderating no matter how you measure them
  85. About a third of everyone doesn’t trust elections
  86. Methotrexate is now a victim of the Supreme Court
  87. Today’s college quarterbacks need mission statements
  88. Raw data: The cost of buying a house
  89. A weekend soliloquy about night sky photography
  90. Did we really add 372,000 jobs last month?
  91. Friday Cat Blogging – 8 July 2022
  92. What’s up with Pennsylvania?
  93. Wages continue to plummet
  94. Chart of the day: Net new jobs in June
  95. My prediction for new jobs
  96. How big is the US economy, anyway?
  97. Lunchtime Photo
  98. Did Donald Trump deploy the IRS in his war against the FBI?
  99. Income inequality hasn’t grown much since the Great Recession
  100. Raw data: How much do Americans earn?
  101. The bulk of the evidence suggests that inflationary pressures are abating
  102. Lunchtime Photo
  103. Maya Forstater wins her transgender case. Good.
  104. How to make friends and influence abortion wafflers
  105. Lunchtime Photo
  106. The Fed is gunning for a completely unnecessary recession
  107. One Cheer for Mitt Romney . . . But That’s All
  108. Abortion travel bans are ridiculous
  109. Republicans are in trouble now
  110. Lunchtime Photo
  111. We are at full employment, more or less
  112. Elon Musk returns
  113. Venus and Mars (and Jupiter)
  114. Raw data: Construction spending in the US
  115. Friday Cat Blogging – 1 July 2022
  116. More Americans are distressed than ever
  117. Today’s worker can buy 80,000 Klondike bars per year
  118. Chart of the day: Consumer spending growth has gone flat
  119. Elon Musk is . . . quiet
  120. Wait, what?
  121. Update: Party defections are tiny and mostly meaningless
  122. Raw data: The price of gasoline is dropping

June 2022

  1. The logic games behind today’s Supreme Court ruling on power regulation
  2. Lunchtime Photo
  3. Lunchtime Photo
  4. Map of the day: Here are the cities where pay has increased the most
  5. Facebook and Instagram decide that abortion is too icky
  6. What will the Supreme Court do next?
  7. Lunchtime Photo
  8. Have progressives been pretty muted about abortion?
  9. We can fight the Supreme Court with abortion pills
  10. California will vote on abortion in November
  11. Raw data: The economic response to the pandemic, US vs. Europe
  12. The myth of FDR’s court packing scheme
  13. Lunchtime Photo
  14. The Republican Party is picking off Democrats
  15. Liberals talk pretty one day. I hope.
  16. Sam Alito and the meaning of life
  17. Prayer in public school is making a comeback
  18. Liberals really suck at defending abortion
  19. For moderates, the end of abortion rights should be a wake-up call
  20. If you wear a mask, wear it above your nose
  21. Conservatives can’t pass a national ban on abortion
  22. Here’s a list of corporations who have promised abortion assistance
  23. Some thoughts on the judiciary
  24. Friday Cat Blogging – 24 June 2022
  25. What’s going on at the Energy Information Administration?
  26. Our little gun bill is set to become law
  27. Vaping leads to higher teen nicotine use
  28. Dems are behind right now, but not by much
  29. Lunchtime Photo
  30. Charts of the day: How we spent our time in 2021
  31. The maternal mortality rate has skyrocketed over the past three years
  32. Lunchtime Photo
  33. Yes, most women should keep abortion pills at home, just in case
  34. You should hire smarts and savvy, not just experience
  35. Gödel explained
  36. We have to improve the education of Black children
  37. Lunchtime Photo
  38. Washington Monthly goes medieval on neoliberalism
  39. Why are liberal Supreme Court justices praising conservatives?
  40. Americans’ mental health held up pretty well during the pandemic
  41. QR menus must be stopped
  42. Raw data: Abortions in the United States
  43. Liberals lose on court deference, but they’re happy anyway
  44. The Uvalde affair gets worse and worse
  45. How badly are trans cancer patients treated by American doctors?
  46. Lunchtime Photo
  47. Here’s a walk down memory lane with the platform of the Texas state GOP
  48. Is low-income housing too expensive?
  49. Our apartment in Paris
  50. Friday Cat Blogging – 17 June 2022
  51. The lessons of Watergate
  52. Recession is coming
  53. Employment is still more important than inflation
  54. Quote of the day: On second thought . . .
  55. What’s the best way to measure inflation?
  56. Lunchtime Photo
  57. The inflation rate has been declining for the past year
  58. When does the Fed hike interest rates?
  59. Why are refineries charging so much for wholesale gasoline?
  60. Lunchtime Photo
  61. Fed should stay calm on inflation
  62. NHTSA releases non-useful crash stats for driverless cars
  63. Mortgage rates have skyrocketed to 6.28% since Thursday
  64. Lunchtime Photo
  65. A housing bust is just around the corner
  66. Red state Republicans are eager boosters of the Big Lie
  67. Ukraine is not the cause of sky-high gasoline prices
  68. What’s wrong with progressive organizations? Just about everything.
  69. The Fed needs to avoid panicking over inflation
  70. The stock market is not really in bad shape. Yet.
  71. Lunchtime Photo
  72. Crackpots in the Oval Office
  73. “Pro-choice” is up — but only among Democrats
  74. Watch the order of your adjectives!
  75. Gun regulation is still going nowhere
  76. Wait. Supply shortages are suddenly yesterday’s news?
  77. COVID-19 Update: Hardly anyone is dying anymore
  78. What’s going on with the price of gasoline?
  79. Politics is just another word for persuasion
  80. How many people still have uncertain opinions about Trump and 1/6?
  81. Friday Cat Blogging – 10 June 2022
  82. Is inflation high because Joe Biden is sleepy?
  83. Right-wing pronoun cops win huge victory in Wisconsin
  84. Chart of the day: Inflation in May
  85. Lunchtime Photo
  86. Vanderbilt study says Americans are hopelessly at each other’s throats
  87. If you’re putting on a show, don’t brag about putting on a show
  88. Inflationary pressure seems to be easing
  89. Lunchtime Photo
  90. The western US is parched and choking
  91. Dumb joke gets star reporter suspended for a month
  92. Gun deal is facing tough times
  93. We’re home!
  94. Lunchtime Photo
  95. Democrats can’t promise to restore abortion rights this fall
  96. BoJo wins landslide leadership mandate
  97. Lunchtime Photo
  98. A COVID-19 parable in three scenes
  99. The Senate’s response to Uvalde is plodding along meaninglessly
  100. Friday Cat Blogging – 3 June 2022
  101. On January 6, Trump’s chief of staff was overwhelmed with panicky text messages
  102. So far, ANWR has been a bust
  103. Does the Johnny Depp victory spell the end of #MeToo?
  104. Chart of the day: Net new jobs in May
  105. Lunchtime Photo
  106. So how’s the vacation going?
  107. Lunchtime Photo
  108. The Supreme Court’s conservatives take a dive on the First Amendment
  109. John Durham got what he deserved yesterday

May 2022

  1. It’s time to hold states accountable for student debt
  2. Lunchtime Photo
  3. Why I’ve given up on gun regulation
  4. Lunchtime Photo
  5. Republicans have ideas about our mass shooting problem
  6. Time to sack the SPACs?
  7. OK, sure, but . . .
  8. Friday Cat Blogging – 27 May 2022
  9. Raw data: Mortgage origination forecasts for 2022
  10. Lunchtime Photo
  11. Civil engineering—both high and low tech—can help fight COVID-19
  12. Lunchtime Photo
  13. What do Americans disagree about the most?
  14. Lunchtime Photo
  15. Raw data: How many households can afford a $400 emergency?
  16. Joe Biden finally got tired of the thin fiction of “strategic ambiguity”
  17. Technology griping session #486
  18. Lunchtime Photo
  19. Hillary didn’t do it
  20. No, let’s not nationalize the infant formula market
  21. Friday Cat Blogging – 20 May 2022
  22. Yes, Paris is the correct answer
  23. Oppose bad wars, not all wars
  24. Lunchtime Photo
  25. Raw data: The unemployment rate of native vs. foreign-born workers
  26. Lunchtime Photo
  27. Sweden and Finland officially want to be members of NATO
  28. Lunchtime Photo
  29. Two statements
  30. Retail spending was up 7% in April
  31. It sure looks like Abbott is the bad guy in the Abbott infant formula scandal
  32. Health update
  33. Lunchtime Photo
  34. Raw data: Live births in the US
  35. There are three puzzling eras in the US COVID-19 timeline
  36. The baby formula shortage is . . . peculiar
  37. CEO pay is up 78% over the past decade
  38. A brief history of recent gasoline prices
  39. Friday Cat Blogging – 13 May 2022
  40. My eye adjustments are finished. Maybe.
  41. Lunchtime Photo
  42. The end of Finlandization
  43. How is wastewater holding up near me lately?
  44. BREAKING! Milky Way is really old.
  45. COVID-19 case rates are way down all over the world
  46. Lunchtime Photo
  47. Monthly mortgage payments have gone up 30% since the start of the year
  48. Opioid overdose deaths are up again in 2021, powered by fentanyl
  49. Here’s why the Russian army sucks so badly
  50. Chart of the day: Inflation in April
  51. Inflation poll results
  52. How does Starlink work? Are the Ukrainians thrilled with it?
  53. Lunchtime Photo
  54. Could Indian tribes become leading providers of abortion in conservative states?
  55. April inflation poll
  56. Abortion attitudes have become more liberal since 2000, all thanks to Democrats
  57. Abortion is now a state issue. Deal with it.
  58. The best response to the baby formula shortage is to be brand flexible
  59. Lunchtime Photo
  60. Practically everyone approves of contraception
  61. Somebody please explain Russia to me
  62. For $7-8 million per week, we can tell the Supreme Court to go fuck itself
  63. Friday Cat Blogging – 6 May 2022
  64. Chart of the day: Net new jobs in April
  65. I am locked down
  66. Lunchtime Photo
  67. Here’s my plan to address homelessness in Los Angeles
  68. Nobody cares how badly Roe was written
  69. Raw data: Views on abortion by state
  70. Lunchtime Photo
  71. How long will we fight the Russians in Ukraine?
  72. People are quitting their jobs at totally normal rates
  73. Lunchtime Photo
  74. A (tiny bit) of good news about Samuel Alito’s decision overturning abortion rights
  75. Court leak spells end to constitutional right to abortion
  76. Raw data: How working-age people spend their time
  77. Three random things
  78. Lunchtime Photo
  79. Raw data: Employment of recent college grads
  80. Housing update
  81. Only in death does Trump part

April 2022

  1. Friday Cat Blogging – 29 April 2022
  2. Worker pay and benefits plummet at record pace. Yes: plummet.
  3. What happens after we cancel student debt?
  4. Lunchtime Photo
  5. GDP was down 1.4% last quarter, but it’s not all bad news
  6. Lunchtime Photo
  7. Net job gains were up yet again last year
  8. Gen Z loves to work
  9. Alex Villanueva is a horrible human being
  10. Is Twitter really that important?
  11. Lunchtime Photo
  12. Why don’t we trust experts anymore? Well, some of us do.
  13. Why did Florida only go after Disney?
  14. What will Elon Musk do with Twitter?
  15. In search of lost Frenchmen
  16. Scary traffic signs don’t always reduce highway crashes
  17. Lunchtime Photo
  18. Ron DeSantis should be in prison.
  19. Here’s a long, boring look at the housing market
  20. Friday Cat Blogging – 22 April 2022
  21. Eyeball Update
  22. For a few minutes in January, Republicans wanted to impeach Trump
  23. Florida finally shows us some of their woke mathematics
  24. Lunchtime Photo
  25. The Republican way of politics is changing
  26. Lunchtime Photo
  27. Superpredators were real. But they aren’t anymore.
  28. When the kids grow up, parents stop working
  29. We don’t have a housing shortage
  30. Some notes on social media
  31. Lunchtime Photo
  32. Unemployment change by state
  33. Nationwide injunctions: A brief explainer
  34. As usual, California’s latest homeless initiative is widely hated
  35. Raw data: Cumulative excess deaths from COVID-19
  36. Raw data: The child day care worker shortage
  37. Lunchtime Photo
  38. Does higher income inequality produce higher crime rates?
  39. Raw data: Prime age workers in the post-COVID era
  40. Eyeball update and more
  41. Friday Cat Blogging – 15 April 2022
  42. Russia says it blew up its own ship, but takes it out on Ukraine anyway
  43. Lunchtime Photo
  44. Kevin’s economic predictions for 2022
  45. Mortgage rates break 5% for the first time in a decade
  46. Gasoline should drop 50 cents per gallon over the next week or two
  47. Dorsey NFT declines 99.991% in 13 months
  48. Lunchtime Photo
  49. Chart of the day: The Producer Price Index vs. the Consumer Price Index in March
  50. A toilet poll — Final response!
  51. A toilet poll
  52. Apple has your best interests at heart when they restrict access to the iPhone
  53. A pandemic puzzler: Kids can no longer tie their shoes
  54. Lunchtime Photo
  55. How much is Tesla overvalued?
  56. Raw data: Joe Biden’s approval among registered voters
  57. Should Democrats change their tune on a few culture war topics?
  58. Chart of the day: Inflation in March
  59. How much is ARP spending responsible for high inflation?
  60. The defeat of voting rights is not hard to understand
  61. Lunchtime Photo
  62. Health Update
  63. Elon Musk is a bad idea
  64. Here are the top 20 items most affected by inflation
  65. Raw data: COVID-19 hospitalizations
  66. Friday Cat Blogging – 8 April 2022
  67. There is no glut of PhDs
  68. Are Walmart truck drivers getting a big raise?
  69. Eyeball update
  70. Chart of the day: Methane emissions reach record high
  71. Let’s fight over the individual mandate some more!
  72. Fun day
  73. Lunchtime Photo
  74. Quote of the day: Do we mint too many PhDs?
  75. LA sheriff is investigating misconduct, but not the kind you’d think
  76. In California, $1 billion in COVID funding has gone to police — so far
  77. Bullshit, bullshit, and more bullshit
  78. Oil is up. Gasoline is up. Any other questions?
  79. Lunchtime Photo
  80. The expanded CTC came to an end. So did Democratic support among recipients.
  81. Chart of the day: The inequality of life expectancy by income
  82. Quote of the day: Colonialism in modern space exploration
  83. Pedophiles are the new socialists
  84. Lunchtime Photo
  85. Raw data: Murder rates in all 50 states
  86. The internet hasn’t increased workaholism in the US
  87. The Great Resignation was neither great nor a resignation
  88. Lunchtime Photo
  89. Here’s how America’s CEOs did last year
  90. Rupert Murdoch is “the most dangerous man in the world”
  91. How’s the latest release of oil from the SPR doing so far?
  92. Does an inverted yield curve mean a recession is near?
  93. Is the Ukraine war all about natural gas?
  94. Yet another look at inflation: NGDP level targeting
  95. Ingraham: Disney will be crushed for opposing us
  96. European inflation spiked up a huge amount in March
  97. Friday Cat Blogging – 1 April 2022
  98. Raw data: Employers are paying workers less and less
  99. The 1950 census is now online. Here’s my family.
  100. Workers finally win vote to unionize Amazon
  101. Chart of the day: Net new jobs in March
  102. Raw data: Teen suicide during the pandemic
  103. Consumer demand remains well anchored

March 2022

  1. Mortgage interest rates are up again
  2. Lunchtime Photo
  3. The whole disgusting “gay grooming” panic is already fading away
  4. Raw data: Inflation rate of goods and services
  5. Can the Strategic Oil Reserve lower gasoline prices?
  6. Lunchtime Photo
  7. Chart of the day: What happens when the improved Obamacare subsidies go away
  8. Three centuries: Science, economics, AI, and the creation of a new world
  9. Lunchtime Photo
  10. Where is our inflation crisis supposed to come from?
  11. Donald Trump has a 457-minute gap on January 6
  12. How high is medical inflation?
  13. Lunchtime Photo
  14. Will Smith assaulted a man with a learning disorder
  15. 1950 census will be online this Friday
  16. Study says krypton excimer lamps safely kill off COVID-19 (probably)
  17. Nine words: “For God’s sake, this man cannot remain in power”
  18. Quote of the day: Life at Fox News became “unsustainable”
  19. Why can anyone create a new cryptocurrency?
  20. The Black death rate from COVID-19 doesn’t entirely make sense
  21. OK, how good are our global supply chains, really? Let’s see the receipts.
  22. Another update on the Swedish model for COVID response
  23. Friday Cat Blogging – 25 March 2022
  24. Russian general says Russia will focus on Donbas
  25. Lunchtime Photo
  26. Global supply chains handled the pandemic with flying colors
  27. Black workers receive unemployment benefits at systemically lower rates than white workers
  28. In Virginia, young voters stayed home as usual
  29. Our long national nightmare is over
  30. The California gasoline premium continues to soar
  31. Lunchtime Photo
  32. Spring refinery shutdowns are back in California
  33. Health Update
  34. Lunchtime Photo
  35. Home prices are headed for a big drop in 2022
  36. The Ngram viewer gets an update!
  37. Why do today’s kids have such big mental health problems?
  38. No one doubts the massive global superiority of NATO and the US military
  39. Lunchtime Photo
  40. Russia has a little more than half its air force left
  41. Ukraine has biolabs. Ukraine is not making bioweapons.
  42. We are still building lots of new housing
  43. Thanks to climate change, we now live in a five sigma world
  44. A question about masks
  45. The Biden laptop was real, but that hardly matters
  46. COVID-19 hospital admissions in the US are near a record low
  47. How much do you value life?
  48. Americans both love and hate affirmative action
  49. Cancel culture: A brief little listicle
  50. Friday Cat Blogging – 18 March 2022
  51. Raw data: Pedestrians and bicyclists involved in motor vehicle crashes
  52. My Week
  53. What kind of vehicles crash into pedestrians the most?
  54. The Texas mail ballot law probably isn’t a big deal
  55. Lunchtime Photo
  56. Lunchtime Photo
  57. Health Update, High Tech Optics Edition
  58. Lunchtime Photo
  59. Housekeeping Note
  60. Lunchtime Photo
  61. Today is Transcendental Day
  62. The metric system in everyday American life
  63. Professionals study logistics. Apparently the Russian army isn’t very professional.
  64. Raw data: Omicron is making a small comeback in Europe
  65. Rick Scott wants to raise federal taxes by $1 trillion
  66. Low light photography with the Pixel 6 Pro
  67. Francis Fukuyama thinks Russia is going down to defeat
  68. Raw data: ICE immigration arrests in the interior of the country
  69. Friday Cat Blogging – 11 March 2022
  70. Medical debt is way down thanks to Obamacare
  71. Raw data: $100,000 adjusted for inflation
  72. Maybe we should rein in the anti-Russia stuff a tiny bit
  73. The penalty for not having health insurance is too damn high
  74. Lunchtime Photo
  75. Black and Hispanic residents were way undercounted in the 2020 census
  76. Raw data: Gasoline price, 1950-2022
  77. Back in the day, I had to live on less than $100,000
  78. Mask mandate on planes extended another month
  79. Chart of the day: Inflation is up yet again
  80. A progress report on the Surface Pro 8 tablet
  81. Go ahead and have a beer today
  82. Crude goes up, crude goes down
  83. Lunchtime Photo
  84. Putin working hard to become the most hated man in the world
  85. Raw data: US spending on gasoline
  86. Lunchtime Photo
  87. Raw data: We’ve lost 824 million IQ points!
  88. Maybe Democrats should ask Republicans only for the “loan” of their vote
  89. Meme of the day: Trump is a dangerous stain on humanity, but of course I’d still vote for him
  90. Axios wants to teach the world how to write like PowerPoint
  91. Today brings yet another masterly discussion about wokeism on campus
  92. Lunchtime Photo
  93. Raw data: Oil spikes and recessions
  94. Omicron surge continues to fizzle out
  95. Donald Trump, master great power strategist, has an idea
  96. Most Russians probably support the Ukraine war. Here’s why.
  97. White Christians of all types prefer Republicans to Democrats
  98. China plans to ease up on COVID-19 restrictions
  99. Health Update
  100. Friday Cat Blogging – 4 March 2022
  101. Here is my gripe with progressive urbanists
  102. The IRS has not been “neglected” for decades. Quite the contrary.
  103. Chart of the day: Net new jobs in February
  104. Where are the pictures of the Ukraine war?
  105. Raw data: The price of (vegetable) oil
  106. Lunchtime Photo
  107. The era of crypto-CDOs is coming fast
  108. Putin wants “full control” of Ukraine
  109. January 6 committee says Trump “might” have committed fraud and obstruction of justice
  110. Lunchtime Photo
  111. European inflation spikes up in February
  112. Fact checking the president
  113. Biden’s SOTU wasn’t great, but it was pretty good
  114. Rick Scott wants to raise taxes by thousands of dollars on poor families
  115. Lunchtime Photo
  116. The price of oil is up. Or is it?
  117. Our sanctions against Russia are tough but still probably won’t work
  118. Let us review the Republican record
  119. Let’s make Europe energy independent
  120. This is a tough night for Biden to be giving a big speech
  121. Good news today!

February 2022

  1. We will not get into a hot war with Russia
  2. Lunchtime Photo
  3. Patrisse Cullors: Defund the police means just what it sounds like
  4. Democrats need to back Biden more loudly on Ukraine
  5. New studies confirm that COVID-19 virus occurred naturally
  6. Why Putin wins: Obvious answers to obvious questions edition
  7. AFPAC: We love us some good ol’ school racism
  8. Can you identify these airplanes?
  9. Are Democratic moderates responsible for the party’s downfall?
  10. Raw data: The latest on the Omicron surge
  11. Friday Cat Blogging – 25 February 2022
  12. Consumer spending is totally normal
  13. Lunchtime Photo
  14. Vladimir Putin is (still) a thug
  15. New poll says a third of Americans believe racism has never been a big problem
  16. Lunchtime Photo
  17. BREAKING NEWS: Disney hates real America
  18. Let’s compare the bottom 50% in the US vs. Europe
  19. Lunchtime Photo
  20. Russia invades Ukraine
  21. Lunchtime Photo
  22. Raw data: Reliability of the US electricity distribution system
  23. Why did pedestrian deaths suddenly turn upward in 2009?
  24. Yet more about housing in the United States
  25. How many excess retirements did the pandemic create?
  26. Update: Housing units in California
  27. Raw data: Housing units in the US
  28. The long arm of the law is closing in on Donald Trump
  29. Friday Cat Blogging – 18 February 2022
  30. The view from Moscow is a grim one
  31. Raw data: Which states have the most job openings?
  32. Eunuchs and the afterlife in medieval China
  33. Here’s an idea for reforming the Electoral Count Act
  34. Lunchtime Photo
  35. Raw data: Interest rates are at an all-time low
  36. Why do presidents (almost) always lose midterm elections?
  37. Mainstream Democrats need to defend the mainstream
  38. Pandemics then and now
  39. Lunchtime Photo
  40. Oil prices explained
  41. A 1-foot rise in sea level equals hundreds of billions of cubic feet of water
  42. After a weak December, people are back to spending, spending, spending
  43. Raw data: Drug use and overdose deaths
  44. Lunchtime Photo
  45. New study shows lead in water causes higher levels of juvenile delinquency
  46. John Durham throws yet more chum into Fox News waters
  47. If you make a ton of money, why not quit young?
  48. Economics for daily life
  49. The FTC says romance scams have increased 230% in five years. Really?
  50. Today’s brass balls award goes to . . .
  51. Lunchtime Photo
  52. Southwest megadrought is now the worst on record
  53. Five scientific challenges
  54. Get your sweetheart a COVID booster for Valentine’s Day
  55. Democracy is still in pretty strong shape
  56. Charlie and the two-tone whiskers
  57. Why would a 15-year-old girl take trimetazidine?
  58. Meet the convoy leaders
  59. Friday Cat Blogging – 11 February 2022
  60. Profits are up! Wages are down!
  61. Staying out of war is not a sign of strength
  62. Lunchtime Photo
  63. In January, women’s coats cost more, car rentals cost less
  64. Inflation remained high in January, earnings continued to fall
  65. Is “rough sex” foul territory for baseball players?
  66. What the hell is a “safe smoking” kit?
  67. Five big things we couldn’t do
  68. Lunchtime Photo
  69. Americans know more about politics than they used to
  70. Raw data: The age of law school faculty has skyrocketed
  71. Train to nowhere gets another cost bump
  72. Lunchtime Photo
  73. For a country on the edge of collapse, America sure seems to do a lot
  74. Pentagon report says White House did pretty well on Afghanistan withdrawal. Wait. What?
  75. The young are no longer the most crime prone demographic
  76. Health update
  77. Teachers aren’t quitting in huge new numbers. Or in any new numbers at all, actually.
  78. Lunchtime Photo
  79. Who’s afraid of Joe Manchin?
  80. A society without trust is just a mob of people
  81. Poll results: Artificial intelligence is coming your way
  82. Here’s yet another estimate of how good different masks are
  83. Progressives are “grim and joyless”
  84. We are pretty close to full employment
  85. Legitimate. Political. Discourse.
  86. Poll: Is AI just another overhyped scam? Or the bedrock of our future?
  87. The demise of democracy is now officially on hold
  88. Why is Denmark removing all COVID-19 restrictions?
  89. We need to stop blaming our problems on foreign “supply chains”
  90. Friday Cat Blogging – 4 February 2022
  91. Chart of the day: Net new jobs in January
  92. Amazon Prime now costs 23% more than when it started
  93. Lunchtime Photo
  94. Facebook is suddenly a feeble and dying giant
  95. More raw data: The global price of food is skyrocketing
  96. Raw data: Interest on the national debt
  97. The Pentagon has finally figured out missile defense
  98. Raw data: Healthcare prices fell dramatically in 2021
  99. Lunchtime Photo
  100. Correction: Auto sales were way down in 2021
  101. Donald Trump is practically daring prosecutors to indict him
  102. Here’s how to deal with Vladimir Putin
  103. Wait: It turns out that car companies did fine in 2021 and imports were way up
  104. We do not have a supply chain crisis. Really.
  105. Lunchtime Photo
  106. Never before has a good economy seemed so bad
  107. Please save me from Web3, Silicon Valley’s latest techno-utopian idiocy
  108. Democrats need to take the Median Voter Theorem more seriously
  109. Today in numismatics: The 99-year-old penny

January 2022

  1. Lunchtime Photo
  2. We don’t have a crime problem, we have a murder problem
  3. What kind of books are suitable for children?
  4. Is Omicron really a mild version of COVID-19?
  5. Cat Ballet
  6. The Ukraine crisis has entered the annals of the bizarre
  7. Friday Cat Blogging – 28 January 2022
  8. School libraries are not post-apocalyptic battlegrounds
  9. Hey, the White House has a new cat!
  10. Are we in another housing bubble?
  11. Ukraine is suddenly a whirlwind of activity
  12. The US economy is slowing down, and that’s a good thing
  13. There is no such thing as the “best qualified” Supreme Court nominee
  14. Lunchtime Photo
  15. Here’s a different look at GDP
  16. What are the best books for middle schoolers about the Holocaust?
  17. Chart of the day: Real GDP growth in Q4
  18. Being average is the last taboo
  19. Too few trucks? Too many trucks? Which is it?
  20. Lunchtime Photo
  21. A mysterious Tennessee time bomb damages schoolkids in 6th grade
  22. Are Democrats doomed to lose control of the federal government forever?
  23. Breyer announces retirement from Supreme Court
  24. Raw data: Average earnings of grocery store workers
  25. Lunchtime Photo
  26. Crypto is just a collectible
  27. The mystery of the missing sharing buttons
  28. Our chip problem is not a supply chain crisis
  29. Can brainwaves predict your destiny?
  30. Lunchtime Photo
  31. The uninsured rate is recovering from four years of Donald Trump
  32. Chart of the day: Supermarkets are chock full of food
  33. Curious about the future of the metaverse? Try “Otherland.”
  34. Revisiting masks: Here’s how different face coverings perform against COVID-19
  35. Advice from a depressive: Things probably aren’t as bad as you think
  36. A look back at Roe v. Wade in the 1970s
  37. Come on folks, get boosted
  38. Raw data: Individual earnings in the United States
  39. Fox News viewers don’t deserve contempt. Save it for the folks fleecing them.
  40. The mask conundrum: A dialogue
  41. What can Joe Biden do to help the Black community more?
  42. Friday Cat Blogging – 21 January 2022
  43. Politico: Trump considered seizing voting machines
  44. Easy money turns out to be not so easy, Part 5,439
  45. Vladimir Putin, geopolitical idiot
  46. Here’s some data about our recent spike in murder
  47. Raw data: School openings over the past year
  48. Lunchtime Photo
  49. Biden is right: Putin is about to dive into a rat hole
  50. Lunchtime Photo
  51. Flights canceled over 5G rollout
  52. How good are various types of masks?
  53. Why is the US death rate from COVID-19 so high?
  54. Lunchtime Photo
  55. Raw data: Current vaccination rates for racial/ethnic groups
  56. We still need to figure out how to make voters angry at Republicans
  57. Will today finally be the day of reckoning for 5G near airports?
  58. Should being nonwhite count as a COVID risk factor?
  59. Whose fault is it that we don’t have enough rapid test kits?
  60. Lunchtime Photo
  61. Thieves have been targeting LA trains for years
  62. The progressive wing of the Democratic Party blew it
  63. Chart of the day: Anger in the United States
  64. Let’s talk about the talking filibuster
  65. Friday Cat Blogging – 14 January 2022
  66. Misinformation is mostly spread by chaotic evil conservatives
  67. No, America is not falling apart at the seams
  68. Nobody expects the Spanish Inquisition
  69. When will blue states enact their own vaccine mandates?
  70. There is no such thing as a filibuster anymore
  71. The peculiar case of the racist red light cameras
  72. Lunchtime Photo
  73. Raw data: Unemployment rate of Black vs. white workers
  74. We should issue free national ID cards to everyone
  75. Oranges are up, tomatoes are down
  76. Who’s responsible for rising beef prices?
  77. Lunchtime Photo
  78. American corporations are becoming more and more partisan
  79. December inflation clocks in at still high 7.1%
  80. Better vaccines are already in the works
  81. Lunchtime Photo
  82. Travel restrictions are crazy now that we have COVID-19 vaccines
  83. Why is President Biden staking so much on passing new voter laws?
  84. The US is now nearly 100% Omicron
  85. What’s the right metric for closing and reopening schools?
  86. Lunchtime Photo
  87. The US economy is doing great
  88. Chart of the day: Vaxxed and unvaxxed in New York City
  89. A brief timeline of CDC advice
  90. The answer to COVID is vaccines, vaccines, and more vaccines
  91. Living with COVID: A conversation starter
  92. Positive results on rapid COVID tests aren’t very trustworthy
  93. Friday Cat Blogging – 7 January 2022
  94. Employment in the United States is pretty strong
  95. Americans are almost universally satisfied with their jobs
  96. Chart of the day: Net new jobs in December
  97. America and its discontents, John Harris edition
  98. Lunchtime Photo
  99. The great Fitchburg vaccination of 1932
  100. Chart of the day: People fully vaxxed by state
  101. The Big Lie
  102. Teen imprisonment is down 81% since 2001
  103. Today’s deep thought: Percentages vs. raw numbers
  104. Fact of the day: The child poverty rate in the United States
  105. Omicron and Jon Stewart continue to ravage the nation
  106. Lunchtime Photo
  107. Americans and their presidents, job approval edition
  108. How many people are sick with COVID-19 right now?
  109. The US military is now 98% vaccinated
  110. A narrow voting rights bill might be our best bet right now
  111. Lunchtime Photo
  112. Media coverage of COVID-19 is out of control
  113. Wait! Maybe social media is terrible after all.
  114. “Modern politics generates demand by manufacturing grievances.”
  115. Judge Reed O’Connor yet again demonstrates his loyalty to the GOP
  116. Health Update
  117. Rising student debt is a very twisty, complicated problem
  118. Are Harry Potter’s goblins caricatures of Jews?
  119. Lunchtime Photo
  120. Hmmm. Here’s more about my odd spike in user registrations.
  121. Is there any way to scare people about Republicans?
  122. Why are so many people registering on my blog?
  123. Was January 6 the result of mass public ignorance? Hardly.
  124. The base rate problem is not your friend
  125. A nostalgia challenge for readers of a certain age
  126. Chart of the day: COVID-19 growth since mid-December
  127. No, New York is not restricting COVID meds to Black people
  128. New Year’s Lunchtime Photo
  129. Top Ten worst trends

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