My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge: because thou hast rejected knowledge, I will also reject thee, that thou shalt be no priest to me. Hosea 4:6

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Political "populism" is always about Us vs Them, the (working) people vs the elite. But right populism only counts 1. some working people as Us, and 2. only some of the wealthy elite (liberals) as Them. Left economic populism doesn't have those contradictions: just working ppl vs the wealthy.

Ya right. It only involves leaving behind your home and large portions of your everyday life, friends, family, colleagues, community… This is also why advice to those struggling with affordability, that they should just “move somewhere cheaper,” is insulting, supercilious, privileged nonsense.

Widespread prosperity, wealth, and well-being both causes and is greater prosperity, wealth, and well-being. Today’s namesake spread that gospel.

OK here come all the people… Time to pour some drinks.

Evolutionary theory meets antitrust? From evolution heavyweight Martin Nowak's Super Cooperators, p. 271. (Nowak co-authored a/the groundbreaking group-selection paper with E.O. Wilson.) www.google.com/books/editio...

Before spiking the 60 Minutes CECOT story, did Bari Weiss try to use her influence and access to get 60 Minutes an interview with administration officials? I’m guessing no.

Will they also feature golden showers?

I assume that the Navy will finally, literally get gold-plated toilet seats.

If US households had to buy back all outstanding US treasuries to zero the "national debt," it would vanish ~18% of HH assets. But ditto, it would remove ~the same amount of liabilities: the need to pay future taxes to service that debt. Ricardian Equivalence FTW.

I’d much like to talk to anybody who’s knowledgeable about NGP VAN and its workings/ecosystem. Topic: I think it’s the culprit in the huge volumes of unending/unendable political text spam that instantly results from a single Act Blue donation. Thanks.

For some of us, it never has been.

Econ models that imagine exclusive "classes," eg workers and "capitalists" (in mainstream heterogenous-agent DSGE and in post-keynesian modeling) have never sat right with me. Here's why: most households both own stuff, and work.

When you buy a home with a mortgage and fixed monthly payments, you’re essentially buying rent control for yourself. Protection against rapid rent increases in your area. I really prefer renting, don’t like being a homeowner, but I bought back in recently (condo) for this reason.

Saying they can’t do “math” is way too complementary. They can’t do grade school arithmetic.

Trump is now touting the idea of “dividends” for soldiers. How about a Common Wealth Dividend, universal income for all Americans, so we all share in the prosperity that we all create together.

Americans are resentful that the anomalously low inflation rates of the 2010s are not eternal.

The oppression of young white men in America: "what appears to have happened is a lot of empty talk, no real significant change, and backlash that is causing real harm." www.peoplespolicyproject.org/2025/12/17/w...

Dani Rodrick @drodrik.bsky.social gets it: “The Post-Neoliberal Consensus is Here” ⬇️ "The first element of the new consensus is a recognition that the concentration of economic power has become excessive." IOW, wealth concentration. Econ policies don't address that reality are ill-conceived.

The plain text, ”subject to the jurisdiction of the United States” clearly means “subject to the laws of.” Do the SCOTUS six really want to try and argue that children who were born to illegal immigrants in America are not subject to prosecution under federal law? Seems…problematic…

Periodic repost It's hard to grasp the magnitude of wildly concentrated wealth: $100K accumulated over years/decades: a 4.3-inch stack of $100 bills. $1B: 3,600 feet. (World's tallest building is 2,722 feet.) Richest ppl: $235B. 160 miles high. 29X as high as Mt. Everest. It's a disease.

The cash carrot won't be all. If you refuse to betray others, they'll go after you and your family. Here's the Bondi memo: www.kenklippenstein.com/api/v1/file/... Originally reported by: www.kenklippenstein.com/p/leak-fbi-l...

please take a moment to appreciate Tesla's epic accomplishment of coming dead last in the auto industry in reliability, despite making relatively expensive cars with a tiny fraction of the moving parts www.consumerreports.org/cars/which-b...

Re-reading this, 30 years later: MAGA “is best visualized as a vicious, lazy, profoundly ignorant, perpetually hungry organism craving the warm god-flesh of the anointed. Personally I like to imagine something the size of a baby hippo, the color of a week-old boiled potato, that lives by itself…

"Allowing anyone to possess that much money is an existential danger to American democracy and society. It simultaneously drives them mad with power and gives them the resources to destroy us all, including themselves." prospect.org/2025/03/25/2...

So silly. All currencies, especially the dollar, are already digital. A global currency would mean a global central bank, and treasury. Good idea?

MAGA is dwindling, and so is their support for Trump.

Karma points awarded for the best explanation of why this (ubiquitous) thinking is incoherent nonsense. (From a Yahoo Finance article that doesn't merit a link.) "Rather than spending more, many households are turning to investment-style options with higher returns for their cash."

In a game of chicken, the winning strategy is to convince your opponent that you've thrown the steering wheel out the window. The winning strategy NOT to actually throw the steering wheel out the window.

The claim here: intolerance for illiberalism is illiberal!

The first sentence carries some truth: the Frankenstein public/private ACA forced upon us by "shopping will save us all" Republicans (twirl finger in cheek) has contributed to the problem. But "MORE 'free market' shopping" as a solution is wrong, by 180 degrees.

It has become received wisdom in Brussels and Washington that there is a new “euro-sclerosis”: that the EU economy is lagging the US This view is wrong A little primer on the measurement of productivity – and why reports of the economic death of Europe are greatly exaggerated🧵

My fellow travelers who say they’re socially liberal but fiscally conservative are not socially liberal. They’ve been (unconsciously, unthinkingly?) captured and owned by Reaganomics memes.

Democratic leadership embracing the MAGA culture of corruption? www.nytimes.com/2025/12/12/o...

Oh Sweet Mother Mary and all the saints in heaven... 🤦‍♂️ (This $1M/$5M "contribution": contribution to who/what?)

"The [Democratic] party's fortunes are just a referendum on how much the public hates Republicans at any given moment." — @interfluidity.com drafts.interfluidity.com/2025/08/20/t...

For those seeking "reasonable" people to follow here on bluesky, I really have to suggest that you not follow this guy. Just one example here.

Regulation of health insurers at the state level is like a highway system where each state decides whether we should drive on the left or the right.

This. Crypto should be illegal, like it is in China. It has no redeeming virtue.

For those who were wondering, this is equivalent to about 2.5% of farm revenues.

Ah, love, let us be true To one another! for the world, which seems To lie before us like a land of dreams, So various, so beautiful, so new, Hath really neither joy, nor love, nor light, Nor certitude, nor peace, nor help for pain; …

It's hard grasp the scale of wealth inequality, and the work-free income that wealth delivers. If u have $10M u can spend $500K/yr w zero work, and just keep getting richer. $10M is bubkes: $200B is 20,000 times as much.

Jeffries' "strong floor and no ceiling" is nuts. Wildly concentrated wealth and economic/political power, in the hands of ever-fewer people, families, and dynasties, is The Great Satan. Time immemorial. Too many econs & policy wonks are blind to that elephant in the room. x.com/RepJeffries/...

In the 90s, 25% of Democrats were self-identified conservatives. Easy pickings. I very much doubt you would have found anything like that many low-hanging liberals in the Republican camp. These days it’s all about base turnout.

"True individual freedom cannot exist without economic security and independence. People who are hungry and out of a job are the stuff of which dictatorships are made.” —FDR, 1944

All these arguments about median "real" income vs expenses exist because they're trying to condense the world in a single-dimensional number or graph. God, and the devil, are in the details. The arithmetic is simple, but one graph doesn't cut it. www.peoplespolicyproject.org/2025/08/29/t...

When a stranger sojourns with you in your land, you shall not do him wrong. You shall treat the stranger who sojourns with you as the native among you, and you shall love him as yourself, for you were strangers in the land of Egypt: I am the Lord your God. Leviticus 19:33-34