Around the Traps 5/7/24

 It is time again for Around the Traps.

Aussie,Aussie,Aussie,Oy,Oy,Oy

• Peter Martin on cheaper-mortgages-tamed-inflation-and-even-higher-home-prices-how-29-forecasters-see-australias-economic-recovery-in-2024
• Ross Gittins on interest-rate-speculators-should-get-back-in-their-box , despite-what-were-led-to-believe-tax-breaks-are-no-free-lunch
• Emily Foley on fatima-payman-breached-caucus-solidarity-what-does-this-mean-and-why-is-it-so-significant
• Jeff Borland on increasing-annual-leave-to-five-weeks-would-cost-employers-less-than-you-might-think
• Andrew Young on australias-long-awaited-national-anti-corruption-body-is-a-year-old-is-it-meeting-expectations
• Jason Harris on asic-has-comprehensively-failed-and-its-role-should-be-split-in-two-according-to-long-awaited-report
• croaking cassandra on reading-reserve-bank-plans-and-budgets
• Kevin Bonham on the-payman-suspension
• Jonathan Karnon and Andrew Partington on ambulance-ramping-is-getting-worse-in-australia-heres-why-and-what-we-can-do-about-it

OZ climate

• nsw-wind-and-solar-auction-comes-up-short-with-one-winning-project-already-built
  
• they-just-fit-in-with-what-we-do-farmers-reap-rewards-as-they-play-host-to-wind-and-solar
  
• missing-link-more-than-420-neighbourhood-batteries-approved-to-boost-rooftop-solar-and-storage-capacity
  
• australia-inches-towards-renewable-targets-as-most-advanced-wind-and-solar-state-goes-backwards
  
• the-nuclear-and-renewable-myths-that-mainstream-media-cant-be-bothered-challenging
  
• right-wing-media-serves-up-more-nonsense-about-blackout-warnings-and-nuclear
  
• household-batteries-are-now-being-marshalled-to-deliver-very-fast-response-to-grid-security-issues
  
• Sven Teske on australias-carbon-budget-may-blow-out-by-40-under-the-coalitions-nuclear-energy-plan-and-thats-the-best-case-scenario
• Jay Gordon on gas-networks-are-making-persistent-and-significant-supernormal-profits
• Peter Martin on when-it-comes-to-power-solar-is-about-to-leave-nuclear-and-everything-else-in-the-shade
• Sven Teske on australias-carbon-budget-may-blow-out-by-40-under-the-coalitions-nuclear-energy-plan-and-thats-the-best-case-scenario
• Magnus Soderberg on nuclear-power-has-an-advantage-not-reflected-in-its-average-price-its-price-stability-and-for-some-users-that-matters
• Hussein Doi et al on why-electric-beats-hydrogen-in-the-race-to-decarbonise-freight-vehicles-in-australia
• Soroush Basirat and Simon Nicholas on hydrogens-potential-onshoring-australian-green-iron-production , hydrogen-holds-great-potential-australias-onshore-green-iron-production
• 
  

Northern America

• Drezners world on the-choice-is-biden-or-harris thanks Brad
• institutional economics on the-myth-of-wage-stagnation-in-the-US
• Menzie Chinn on guest-contribution-let-china-pay-the-cost-of-solar-energy-and-electric-vehicles
• Daniel Flitton on so-trump-took-out-debate-what-if-biden-wins-election
• Ben Scott on tale-high-stakes-nerves-centre-white-house
• noahopinion on time-to-think-about-a-second-trump-term , assessing-the-threats-to-the-republic
• Menzie Chinn on guest-contribution-let-china-pay-the-cost-of-solar-energy-and-electric-vehicles
• Lester Munson on the-most-realistic-way-to-replace-joe-biden-as-the-democratic-presidential-nominee-allow-him-a-graceful-exit
• Angry Bear on the-gish-gallop-tactic-used-by-trump
• David Frum on trump-should-never-have-had-this-platform
• Riley Keenan on supreme-court-makes-prosecution-of-trump-on-obstruction-charge-more-difficult-with-ruling-to-narrowly-define-law-used-against-him-and-jan-6-rioters
• Ian Millhiser on supreme-court-netchoice-moody-paxton-first-amendment , supreme-court-trump-immunity-dictatorship
• Richard Hasen on supreme-court-trump-immunity-john-roberts-legacy
• Tyler Cowen oon how-we-should-update-our-views-on-immigration
• Tim Harris on 2024_election_stakes_are_now_astronomical_supreme_court_has_made_the_presidency_above_the_law
• Jim Vanderhei and Mike Allen on trump-2025-imperial-us-presidency
• Frank Bowman on trump-2024-supreme-court-immunity-ruling-be-afraid
• Dahlia Lithwick and Mark Stern on supreme-court-trump-immunity-president-seal-team-six-assassinate-rival , supreme-court-maga-john-roberts-trump-handmaiden
• Liz Andersen on supreme-court-rules-hitler-immune-from-prosecution-for-burning-down-reichstag-seizing-absolute-power
• Brian Stelter on biden-age-debate-media-coverage
• Anne Applebaum on replace-biden-strategic-plan
• Fintan O'Toole on savior-complex-biden
• David Remnick on the-reckoning-of-joe-biden
• Steve Vladeck on supreme-court-chevron-roberts
• Abdallah Fayyad onold-politicians-gerontocracy-age-limits
• the conversable economist on patriotism-melting-pot-salad-bowl-chocolate-fondue

Europe

• Alex Tabarrok on how-the-german-welfare-state-punishes-performance
• Patrick Shea on what-happens-next-in-ukraines-debt-negotiations-could-change-the-course-of-the-war
• Mainly Macro on why-tactical-voting-in-this-election-could-change-the-nature-of-the-UK's-political-debate
• renew economy on eu-surpasses-50-pct-renewable-power-share-for-first-time-in-first-half-of-2024-germany-at-65-pct
• Renaud Foucard on russia-has-become-so-economically-isolated-that-china-could-order-the-end-of-war-in-ukraine
• Isaac Chotiner on why-the-french-far-right-triumphed

Asia

• Henry Storey on china-s-spluttering-growth-engines
• Jeffrey Robertson on south-korea-s-nuclear-ambition-holds-place-national-consciousness
• Jane Hardy on putin-goes-pyongyang-should-we-be-worried
• Paras Natna on chandrababu-naidu-modi-s-coalition-partner-complements-his-global-outlook
• Evan Freidin on india-s-plan-world-without-cash
• Ved Shinde on why-modi-will-go-moscow
• Joshua Leifer on a-moral-strategic-and-diplomatic-abyss-israel

Wonk

• Susi Ferrarello on are we all hypocrites Thanks Nick
• XN Iraki on kenya-unrest-the-deep-economic-roots-that-brought-gen-z-onto-the-streets
• Tim Harford on shakespeares-forgotten-legacy-hyperbolic-numbers
• Menzie Chinn on guest-contribution-central-bank-credibility-and-institutional-resilience
• noahopinion on the-elemental-foe
• Ashton Robinson on south-africa-strange-noises-cabinet
• Tyler Cowen on an-overly-simple-model-of-positive-and-negative-contagion

General

• Adhi Oktaviana et al on found-in-a-cave-in-indonesia-we-can-now-show-the-worlds-oldest-figurative-art-is-51-200-years-old

Climate

• skeptical science on fact-brief-lag
• the conversable economist on world-energy-some-snapshots
• open mind on how-hot

Andrew Gelman ( mainly stats)

• its-lumbar-time-wrong-inference-because-of-conditioning-on-a-reasonable-but-in-this-case-false-assumption
  
• toward-a-shnerbian-theory-that-establishes-connections-between-the-complexity-nonlinearity-chaotic-dynamics-number-of-components-of-a-system-and-the-capacity-to-infer-causality-from-datasets
  
• what-was-going-on-in-statistics-in-1990
  
• interactive-and-automated-data-analysis-thoughts-from-di-cook-hadley-wickham-jessica-hullman-and-others
  
• holes-in-bayesian-statistics-my-talk-tomorrow-at-the-bayesian-conference-based-on-work-with-yuling
  
• obnoxious-receipt-from-spirit-airlines
  
• a-columbia-surgeons-study-was-pulled-he-kept-publishing-flawed-data
  
• grappling-with-uncertainty-in-forecasting-the-2024-u-s-presidential-election
  
• you-can-guarantee-that-the-term-statistical-guarantee-will-irritate-me-heres-why-and-lets-go-into-some-details
  
• Freakometrics on contribution of machine learning in modelling rare values and imbalanced data
• Kaiser Fung on combining-probabilities

Dianne Coyle ( quirky + book reviews)

• Emma Shortis on american-authoritarianism-has-a-long-history-what-can-it-tell-us-about-trump-and-the-battle-for-americas-soul
• Tyler Cowen on what-ive-been-reading , emergency-money

Vox Wonk

• changes-global-corporate-bond-markets-and-dynamics-around-investment-grade-threshold
  
• europes-demographic-winter-and-new-eu-fiscal-rules
  
• capital-21st-century-ownership-firms-producing-raw-materials
  
• sequential-contrast-effects-hiring-and-admission-interviews
  
• economic-consequences-geopolitical-fragmentation-evidence-cold-war
  
• the-return-of-industrial-policies
  
• economic-consequences-geopolitical-fragmentation-evidence-cold-war
  
• evaluating-spring-budget-and-uks-fiscal-rules
  
• how-students-parents-and-teachers-affect-integration-minorities-classroom
  
• digital-euro-can-strengthen-financial-stability-limits
  
• educational-scarring-and-cost-business-cycles
  
• gendered-change-150-years-transformation-us-hours
  
• new-curse-critical-minerals
  
• lessons-history-how-removing-barriers-knowledge-can-spur-innovation
  

Book Review The Big Short

 I got this book for Christmas but have only just read it recently.

I knew Michael Lewis was a good writer no great writer when I read Liars Poker. It was a fantastic read.

The Big Short is a great book and the basis for a very good movie.

Just read the book. you will enjoy it.  you will get some understanding of what the GFC was all about.

Aussie Politics

 Well things are happening  domestically.

Fatima Payman an ALP senator frrom WA is apparently considering leaving the ALP because of her belief that Palestine should be a country. I have a few problems with this. Firstly she said nothing on this topic in caucus when it was debated. Strange if you are a strong supporter. Secondly what is the point if you support Palestine as a state ( as I do) iff Gaza is complete rubble and there are 750,000  Israelis living in the West Bank! It would be some country if you recognised it now.

Me thinks it is all about what occurs when she is up for re-election. She is unlikely to win. Maybe if she changes she is thinking she can win. Who knows.

The Coalition wants there to be divestiture with regard to supermarkets. This clearly has not be thought through. Who is going to compete against the big two with a few supermarkets they have to build and then make work. what do you think coles and woolies would do? Drop prices and create havoc.

I see there are some still calling for rates to rise. Oh dear. Let us go back and say it again. domestic demand or GNE is a mere 1% and falling. Just where do you want it to be -4%? Unemployment is rising. It is merely taking a bit longer then usual. Remember the CPI is a lagging indicator. moreover we have seen in the past rogue quarterly CPI figures. This is more likely to occur in monthly numbers!

Sometimes it is an advantage to be old

No-one can trust the US Supreme court.

 The US Supreme court has just handed down a decision which is bonkers and really can only be explained by politics.

See HERE , HERE and HERE

THe US President is now a King who could assassinate a rival or organise a coup to stay in power!!

Apparently telling the DOJ to say the election was a fraud is part of the Presidential powers.

Before this ruling every credible legal analyst said the immunity case was bonkers. Now bonkers is the new normal.

Watergate was not illegal according to this ruling!

The Supreme court is simply making law up as they go just to favour Trump and republicans. It is they who will determine environmental regulation now not the relevant experts.

Quite simply no-one can trust the Supreme court now except Trump.