Inflation is a concern. Consumer prices increased by nearly 6% between June and July, on an annualized basis. This means that if prices continued to increase at this rate for a year, then prices would be 6% higher by the end of the year. This is triple the average annual rate of inflation over the

The Centers for Disease Control & Prevention (CDC) recently announced an extension to the eviction moratorium purportedly to slow the spread of COVID-19. This moratorium cannot be justified on economic grounds and is likely to harm the housing market. A caricature of landlords is one of a heartless, Ebenezer Scrooge-type who collects exorbitant rent on

Job openings are everywhere. One cannot drive down a street without seeing “Help Wanted” signs in front of most businesses. Anyone who goes to a bar, restaurant or other commercial establishment is likely to encounter slow, short-staffed service. These labor shortages are a unique feature of the COVID-19 recession. During a typical recession, the situation

The idea behind Keynesian economics, as purported by the late British economist John Maynard Keynes and his followers, is that when the economy is in a recession, taxes should be cut and/or government spending increased to stimulate the economy and end the recession. Tax cuts give people more money to spend. Government spending creates jobs

Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell and Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen have said that if there is inflation, it will be “transitory,” meaning a short-term phenomenon. The argument is that COVID-19 has disrupted global supply chains, resulting in price increases for various goods. Once these disruptions are fixed, inflation should subside. It is like when gasoline

Anyone who has driven on the roads lately or traveled by plane knows that America’s infrastructure could use an upgrade. Fifty percent of Michigan’s state and county roads are rated as being in “poor” condition. State roads are in better shape, but their condition is projected to deteriorate and be in poor condition within the

On March 11, President Biden signed the $1.9 trillion COVID-19 Relief Bill. Although many Americans will welcome the $1,400 checks and other benefits, the bill presents numerous issues. Someone gets $1,400 so long as he/she has income less than $75,000 or less than $112,500 for a head-of-household. No distinction is made for whether the recipient

During the last week of January, the price of the GameStop Corporation stock increased from $20/share to nearly $350/share. The GameStop business model was thought to be in trouble as video game purchases moved online. According to the data collection company, Statista, about 83% of video game purchases are currently made online, compared to 20%

Between March 2020 and January 2021, the price of a Bitcoin skyrocketed from $6,000 to $40,000. This leads to the question of whether Bitcoin is a “bubble” like the dot com stocks were in the late 1990s and the housing market was in the mid-2000s. It is hard to identify a bubble; just because an

Twenty-million jobs were lost in April due to the shutdown, representing 20 years of job gains. There was a solid recovery early this summer, with 2.7 million jobs created in May and 4.8 million jobs created in June. However, the rate of job creation has steadily declined since then, so that only 245,000 jobs were

To mitigate COVID in the winter months, there will likely be calls for another economic shutdown. However, a second shutdown could be catastrophic for our economy and thus, should be avoided at almost all cost. Gross Domestic Product (GDP) is the total value of all final goods and services produced in the economy, measured over

The recovery in air travel following the COVID-19 shutdowns has stalled and remains at about 40% of 2020 levels. Corporations such as General Motors have extended work-from-home until at least 2021 and could likely extend it after that until the coronavirus vaccine is widely distributed, namely until the second-half of 2021. Working from home likely