Portside

Since President Biden took office, the media have run a constant stream of news stories about how high various prices were and telling their audiences that this has led to mass suffering.

The whole subsidy to retiree story is a diversion from the many important issues facing the country. Even the core idea, that we don’t adequately support the young because we give too much to the elderly is wrong.

One recent media report is emblematic of the kinds of errors the press makes when it sees a chance to put pressure on a Black progressive mayor.

The moral of the story is that there is nothing about AI technology that should lead to mass unemployment and inequality. If those are outcomes, it will be the result of how we structured the rules, not the technology itself.

Should China should be terrified that its population is now falling, as all our leading news outlets are telling us?

Fortunately, there are some ideas for challenging the control the rich have over the media. We are not going to be able to prevent the rich from buying media outlets. Instead, we will have to go the other way and allow the non-rich to have a voice.

Policies that give more money to people at the top are inflationary. If we want to help the working class we have to pursue policies that reverse upward redistribution, not promise the return of manufacturing jobs that no longer offer a wage premium.

Should Jerome Powell put on his Paul Volcker outfit and push interest rates through the roof? I would argue that, while modest rate hikes are appropriate, it is too soon to bring out the heavy artillery.

The rise in the index of aggregate hours would be equivalent to more than 630,000 jobs with no changes in workweeks. Drop in unemployment in Novembers were largest for the groups that face labor market discrimination.

We don’t need patent monopolies to finance the development of drugs or vaccines.