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George Robertson on the “Trump Show”
George Robertson has produced a compelling, data-driven, chart-rich analysis assessing the likely trajectory of Trump’s agenda. Here’s his conclusion: “Trump must reboot and take up Congress as a full partner in all his agenda. I do not think that will be done so Trump [is] likely to end up in protracted glowering and bombast and…
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Trump’s Math Gaffes
In our Sunday, April 13, post, entitled “Yippy,” we offered the following paragraph: We will write separately about the technical miscalculations used in the original trade release from the Trump administration. They are an absolute embarrassment for Navarro and company and their so-called experts. When their miscalculations were revealed in detail, the powers that be…
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“Yippy”
“I thought that people were jumping a little bit out of line. They were getting yippy. You know, they were getting a little bit yippy, a little bit afraid.” — Donald Trump, April 9, 2025. Songwriter Stan Jones (1914–1963) wrote the song “Ghost Riders in the Sky,” which is based on a cowboy legend he heard as a…
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Tariffs — Damn the Torpedoes
Tariffs: Damn the Torpedoes! My friend and fishing buddy Jack Farley was kind enough to inquire about my views regarding the current tariff chapter being written into American history. To adapt the famous phrase, damn the torpedoes, here are the results. I decided not to hold anything back. In an April 4 interview, we covered…
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Trump Tariff Outcomes?
Does the Trump bear market bring the S&P 500 Index down to 4000? Does it result in a drop of S&P earnings (2025–2026) from the pre-Trump Tariff War estimate of $260–$270 down to the $200–$220 range? Worst case: Yes! With a serious recession and more upheaval. Best case: Rapid trade deals are made, and the…
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D.T. 2.0 Tariffs
DT 2.0 used a formula to calculate tariffs based primarily on the trade deficit between the US and each country as a trading partner. The formula converts the trade deficit into a percentage. That is how it gets to tariff rates with a floor of 10% and no ceiling. Essentially, the larger the trade deficit,…
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Trump’s Tariff War
I will use just one of many incoming messages to summarize the nearly universal view about the Trump tariff announcement. Doc A. wrote: I haven’t made a prediction in 5 years, but I just read 3 emails from “news” agencies that made mumbled speculations about today. It seems clear to me. Here’s what I see…
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Secondary Tariffs – Do They Work?
First, the definition — “A secondary tariff is a monetary sanction imposed on countries that trade with a country with which the US is at odds, such as Venezuela. This type of tariff aims to pressure these countries to reduce their involvement in the trade of goods or services with the US target country. For…
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Measles and US Public Health
(Shutterstock) Lessons from history, reported in our new book, The Fed and the Flu: Parsing Pandemic Economic Shocks, are playing out in Texas and 19 other states as measles outbreaks continue to expand, principally sickening unvaccinated children. The CDC maintains a webpage on “Measles Cases and Outbreaks,” updated each Friday. On Friday, March 28, the CDC reported,…
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Lost Pages: Eroding Our Confidence in Public Data
Here’s a guest post from Philippa Dunne & Doug Henwood of TLR Analytics on the implications of an executive order purging advisory boards that ensure the reliability of BLS data. I am in 100% agreement with their message. David R. Kotok, March 27, 2025 (The above was first published on The Kotok Report website and via LISTSERV.…