Finally, some positive news for US demographics.  When Covid-19 debuted last year, a common observation was that the lockdown would result in an increase in births.  We disagreed based on analysis of prior pandemics.  But we also expected that the…

It is not surprising that persons who have been cooped up for more than a year are willing to pay hundreds of dollars per day for a rental car in Hawaii or dine at a restaurant without paying much attention…

Structural disinflation prevailed prior to the pandemic.  It will reappear once we get past the post-pandemic surge in demand that is accentuated by various supply issues.  Although the headlines for the surge in the CPI painted a grim picture, there…

Despite more than 20 years of contrary evidence, the view that an increase in the aged dependency ratio will be inflationary continues to thrive.  The latest entry is The Great Demographic Reversal by Charles Goodhart and Manoj Pradhan.  Their analysis…

At long last, payroll employment recorded a solid gain that exceeded expectations.  Considering the increased focus on inflation, it is not surprising that there is a heightened interest regarding wages.  Our preference has always been to analyze wage developments using…

Now that the angst regarding a tightening of monetary policy has subsided, we can again focus on the Fed’s pledge to restore full employment.  One of the metrics used in the past to measure maximum employment is the labor force…

How will workers respond to the inflation surge?  It is an especially important question since the current situation is without precedent – there was almost no deceleration in wage growth in response to the pandemic (see Charts 1 and 2). …

Relief from unpleasant inflation numbers is on the horizon - the CPI for May reaffirms our view that inflation will soon peak as it continued the pattern established in April, i.e., the monthly increase is mainly a combination of higher…

As we wrote last month, we expected that better developments in April household employment would be followed by better news on May payroll employment.  The May increase of 559,000 is better than it appears as there were upwards revisions to…

For the third time since 2013, China has modified its one-child policy.  In 2013, China expanded exemption from the one-child policy to include families where only one parent was an only child (previously both parents had to be only children). …