What this means is that Trump has stolen an estimated $100mm from US taxpayers by avoiding the pending audit of his filed returns. www.bloomberg.com/news/article...
Blanche Strikes Deal With GOP Holdouts to Advance His Nomination
Holdout Republican senators are backing a deal with acting Attorney General Todd Blanche to formally rescind an order creating an “anti-weaponization fund” that could have paid $1.8 billion to Preside...
bloomberg.com
Why in God's name would any Senator (looking at you #Tillis and #Cornyn) believe anything promised by this administration - even if its in writing? Just kill the nomination, ok?
Trump Administration Live Updates: Blanche Bows to Pressure From Republican Senators
nytimes.com
It seems fitting to name a highway that leads into the empty desert after Trump as he leads our country into a desolate future.
We’ve opened the strait that was never closed, ceasing a ceasefire for a war that was never a war, stopping Iran from charging tolls because tolls are illegal, all so Trump can charge his *own* tolls because *his* tolls are legal. This will hurt affordability which is a hoax anyway
Catherine Rampell@crampell.bsky.social · last mo.A 20% charge would work out to about $32 million for a fully-loaded very large crude carrier at current oil prices. That’s far higher than the tolls that have been charged by Iran, which have previously been described as reaching $2 million www.bloomberg.com/news/article...
The #USMNT could show some class by declining to start Balogun to signal their disapproval of FIFA’s process foul. Then sub him in later once the point has been made.
A timely history of economic thought piece on the eve of our 250th from Jeff Frankel.
The Meaning of Limited Government—Then and Now
Jeffrey Frankel doesn’t see what Republicans see in the legacy of the laissez-faire principles articulated 250 years ago.
prosyn.org
My two cents on why suspending the gas tax is a bad idea.
Marketplace@marketplace.org · 3mo agoPresident Trump has proposed pausing the gas tax. Experts say it could worsen the national deficit without saving you much at the pump.
@gibmetcalf.bsky.social and @jasonbordoff.bsky.social proposed something similar in 2009. newrepublic.com/article/4688...
Breaking The Boom-bust Oil Cycle
Jason E. Bordoff is Policy Director of the Brookings Institution's Hamilton Project and Gilbert E. Metcalf is Professor of Economics at Tufts University. Gas is cheap again, and that's a mixed blessi...
newrepublic.com
Time to pull this old post out. A federal gas tax holiday is a hollow gesture. Saves - at most - 18 cents. That assumes the oil companies don't pocket it but pass it on. econofact.org/should-we-su...
Should We Suspend Gas Taxes to Counter High Oil Prices? | Econofact
The price of gasoline has spiked since the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Politicians have been quick to call for a temporary suspension of gas excise taxes. But is this good policy?
econofact.org
Wonder what the impact of Trump's Iran Fiasco will have on heating oil cost's this coming winter? Brent Nov. 26 prices are up 40 percent since the beginning of February. Markets are finally beginning to figure out that there could be long-term impacts of this ill-conceived venture.
Economists have long taught that cartels are hard to sustain. OPEC has struggled over the years with cheating and over-production. But this is the first explicit breach, brought about by political differences and leadership struggles w/in OPEC. www.nytimes.com/2026/04/28/w...
United Arab Emirates Says It Will Leave OPEC in Blow to Oil Cartel
nytimes.com
Read @jvl.bsky.social on a subtler cost of Trump's Iran War: the US's ability to borrow on the cheap "If petrodollar system were to change, then America’s ability to finance debt as cheaply as we do would be imperiled. And so our ability to sustain Social Security & Medicare would be imperiled, too"
The Iran War Is Coming for Your Social Security
A story about petrodollars, the gold standard, and the greatest trick Uncle Sam ever played.
thebulwark.com
Boy, if it was ever a time for Congress to step up and assert their authority, now is the time. A president elected by less than a majority of voters is single-handedly destroying the reputation of the United States, ...
Aaron Rupar@atrupar.com · 4mo agoTucker Carlson: "It's vile. It begins w/ a promise to use the US military to commit a war crime. Those people who are in direct contact w/ the president need to say 'No. I'll resign. I'll do whatever I can do legally to stop this, bc this is insane. And if given the order, I'm not carrying it out'"
Another way to see the anomalous growth in V.'s proven reserves is in this video. Crank the speed up for a cool visual:
World Proven CRUDE OIL reserve 1960 2025
YouTube video by Stats Media
youtu.be
Why do analysts keep claiming that Venezuela has the greatest amount of proven oil reserves? Their reserves jumped in the mid-1980s when oil prices shot up, but they didn't decline as prices fell.
The Economics Nobel committee delivers a pretty clear rebuke to Trump's war on science and university research.
The Sveriges Riksbank Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel 2025
The Sveriges Riksbank Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel 2025 was awarded "for having explained innovation-driven economic growth" with one half to Joel Mokyr "for having identified ...
nobelprize.org
Additionally, Republican leaning districts, which overlap significantly with rural areas, see marked advantages compared to Democratic districts. These results highlight the potential for a VMT tax to address longstanding inequities in transportation funding
Anyone looking for a short video in their Intro Econ course on international trade and tariffs? Show this and you'll have plenty of time left over to talk about the Red Sox.
Justin Wolfers@justinwolfers.bsky.social · last yr.Still explaining: How do tariffs work, and who pays?
An electric utility's email alert program appears to reduce peak demand and provides significant private savings to the utility. Social savings, however, are small, from @GibMetcalf.bsky.social https://www.nber.org/papers/w34089
Check out this commentary by @kclausing.bsky.social @allanhsiao.bsky.social @gibmetcalf.bsky.social Marilyn Pereboom, and @cwolfram.bsky.social that analyzes the Foreign Pollution Fee Act's potential impacts on several economic and environmental outcomes: ceepr.link/FPFA
CBO estimate of the distributional impacts of the #OBBBA are out and it is not pretty. This is hugely regressive. And it aggravates our already worrying federal debt situation.
Whoa. Watch out for sec. 899 in this awful House bill.
There’s a ticking time bomb in Trump’s ‘big, beautiful bill’
Investors are fretting about a clause that would penalise foreign holders of US assets
on.ft.com
Uh, oh. Be sure to wash your hands every time you refill your bird feeder.
Robert Reich@rbreich.bsky.social · last yr.Trump’s HHS is canceling a contract to develop an mRNA bird flu vaccine, even as the disease continues to spread through dairy cows across the U.S. Make no mistake: delaying the development of this vaccine puts people’s lives at risk.
I hope the follow-up question was "Now that you know, will you vote to strip out that provision in the final bill?"
Brian Tyler Cohen@briantylercohen.bsky.social · last yr.Beyond parody.
The monthly @hillsdalecollege.bsky.social Imprimis publication never fails to amuse even if it generally goes in for right-wing fabulism at the expense of facts and rigor. The May issue was readable with an essay on tariffs by John Steele Gordon.
This should go without saying, but even if every person who voted for Trump supported his illegal, careless, and destructive actions, it is important to remember that A MAJORITY OF VOTERS VOTED AGAINST TRUMP.
