Important Takeaways:
- The 2024 presidential campaign comes to a conclusion today, and it all comes down to the battleground states where the margins are razor thin. Voters across the country are lining up to cast their ballot and election officials are taking extra security precautions to protect them.
- More than 80-million Americans voted early, and this Election Day millions more will cast their ballots with polls showing a tight race to the very end.
- The race between Trump and Harris appears to be a toss-up in seven battleground states. According to the final Emerson College Polling/The Hill, the races are so close they’re a statistical tie.
- Voters in Virginia told CBN News what issues are most important to them.
- “The economy, the economy, the economy,” said one voter. “I vote my wallet.”
- Meanwhile, state officials are beefing up security to keep election workers and polling places safe.
- A vote counting site in Maricopa County, Arizona has added metal detectors, armed guards, surveillance cameras and if necessary, a SWAT team.
- And in the nation’s capital, security fences have been installed in case of violent protests following the election.
- “The FBI is looking at all those threats that come in,” said James Barnacle, Deputy Assistant Director of the Criminal Division.
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Important Takeaways:
- President Joe Biden has said he will not intervene to force striking ILA union workers back on the job at East and Gulf coast ports, a political calculation that balances the power of unions ahead of a tight election with concerns about the economy, the No. 1 issue for many voters.
- Biden and top administration officials including Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg and acting Secretary of Labor Julie Su have focused more attention on the ocean carriers and “price gouging” since the strike began.
- If the union prevails in its battle for a large wage increase, there is the risk of a resumption of wage inflation that could upset the Fed’s so-far successful efforts to tame inflation, though recent Fed concern has focused more on a potential labor slowdown than boom conditions.
- President Biden said on Tuesday that his administration will be “monitoring for any price gouging activity” that benefits foreign ocean carriers, including those on the USMX board. He also said “foreign ocean carriers have made record profits since the pandemic, when Longshoremen put themselves at risk to keep ports open.”
- For months, logistics and business trade groups representing major industries from retail to manufacturing and agriculture have sent numerous letters to Biden and his administration urging intervention. Now, with the president sticking to his position that collective bargaining is the only means for a “fair deal” for the ILA, executives across the economy are beginning to weigh the potential pricing impacts for their business models.
- Steve Lamar, CEO of the American Apparel and Footwear Association, said “Allowing the status quo to persist increases the likelihood that this port crisis will hurt our industry and the overall U.S. economy through job losses, higher prices, and goods shortages”
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Important Takeaways:
- The first panacea for a mismanaged nation is inflation of the currency; the second is war. Both bring temporary prosperity; both bring permanent ruin. But both are the refuge of political and economic opportunists.” Ernest Hemingway
- The United States federal debt has soared to $35.3 trillion. In less than a year, the federal government has increased its debt by $1.9 trillion. This occurred during years of record tax revenues and economic growth.
- If the current administration remains in power, the Treasury’s own estimates predict an additional $16 trillion increase in debt by 2034, without accounting for any recession or slowdown in tax receipts. According to the CBO, the Kamala Harris economic plan would add another $1.9 to $2,2 trillion to the national debt.
- The Harris campaign has not even bothered to discuss a plan to balance the budget. She just said that “efficiency” and the old fallacy of taxes to the rich would pay for the increase in spending—two things that have proven to do nothing to the ballooning debt and that do not even start to scratch the already unsustainable $2 trillion deficit.
- In a recent article, Claudia Sahm stated that you should not worry about debt. “Debt is neither inherently good nor bad. As such, the question is not what the right level of borrowing is, but rather what’s the economic return on the borrowing or the societal goals it advances.” She continues to say that “the government can easily service its debt because of its unlimited taxing authority and ability to issue more U.S. Treasury securities to repay maturing securities” (“The US debt is now $34 trillion. Don’t worry. Seriously”. January16, 2024). Now you must worry. A lot.
- It is true that debt is not inherently bad, but unproductive borrowing is. It is a massive transfer of wealth from the productive sector to the bloated bureaucratic state. Furthermore, the societal goals cannot be unlimited. The government must administer and not just add expenditures to previous expenditures, particularly when there is no realistic analysis of the success or failure of government programs. The idea that a particular government program is beneficial is not enough to add it to the budget without reducing other expenses. Not even a benign view of government spending as Sahm’s can justify that every government expenditure item today is essential.
- Furthermore, we must always understand that governments do not give money for free. They tax the productive sector and borrow, which means printing a currency that is constantly losing purchasing power. Therefore, the government is not advancing societal goals by borrowing without control; it is implementing a profoundly regressive policy that creates a dependent subclass and makes it increasingly difficult for the middle class to thrive.
- It is false that the government has “unlimited” taxing authority and the ability to issue more debt, i.e., print money. The government has economic, fiscal, and inflationary limits. Economic because constantly increasing taxation leads to stagnation and more debt; fiscal because expenditures are consolidated and annualized, while tax receipts are cyclical; and inflationary because the constant issuance of new currency, which is what happens when more debt is issued, leads to the loss of confidence in the currency and the erosion of its purchasing power. If what Sahm and Kelton state were true, the euro area and Japan would be examples of high growth and economic strength, but they are examples of stagnation, high debt, and rising social discontent.
- The government does not set taxes to fund its incessant spending habits. Taxes should be set according to the economic reality of an economy. The fallacy of taxes to the rich and corporations does not even address the ballooning deficit and erodes economic growth and productive investment.
- When someone tells you not to worry about record debt, you should be extremely concerned. When they say that the government has unlimited resources, they mean that you will pay by becoming poorer with more taxes, more inflation, lower growth, or all three at the same time.
- When they tell you that $35 trillion of debt is peanuts compared with $142 trillion of American wealth, they are saying that the government will be pleased to absorb the wealth of the economy. You will pay.
- When they tell you that tax cuts are the problem, it comes from the perspective that the private sector is an ATM at the disposal of governments
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Important Takeaways:
- The U.S. economy has remained remarkably strong even amid persistent inflation and high interest rates.
- And yet, 59% of Americans falsely believe that the U.S. is currently in a recession, according to a recent survey of 2,000 adults by Affirm in June.
- Citing higher costs and difficulty making ends meet, most respondents said they think a recession started roughly 15 months ago, in March 2023, and could last until July 2025, Affirm found.
- Still, regardless of the country’s economic standing, many Americans are struggling in the face of sky-high prices for everyday items, and most have exhausted their savings and are now leaning on credit cards to make ends meet.
- Economists have wrestled with the growing disconnect between how the economy is doing and how people feel about their financial standing.
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Important Takeaways:
- Even Americans earning more than six figures are worried about their finances
- A growing number of Americans making six-figure salaries are worried about paying their monthly bills, according to a new survey published by the Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia.
- The survey shows that more than 30% of respondents earning between $100,000 and $149,999 are concerned about making ends meet within the next six months. That marks a sharp increase from one year ago, when 21.3% of individuals in that income bracket expressed concern about making ends meet.
- At the same time, about 32.5% of individuals earning more than $150,000 are worried about being able to pay their bills, which also marks an increase from the 21.7% figure reported one year ago.
- Interestingly, those more affluent Americans are actually more worried about their finances than many individuals who are earning less money. About 29.8% of individuals making between $40,000 and $69,999 said they are concerned, up from 23.9% last year.
- The typical U.S. household needed to pay $227 more a month in March to purchase the same goods and services it did one year ago because of still-high inflation. Americans are paying on average $784 more each month compared with the same time two years ago and $1,069 more compared with three years ago.
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Important Takeaways:
- Americans are down on the economy (again), with inflation topping election concerns
- After a spurt of optimism, Americans are feeling a little more glum about the economy — again.
- Consumer sentiment, a gauge of Americans’ economic perceptions, is at a six-month low, according to a closely watched index by the University of Michigan. The measure notched its biggest drop since 2021, reflecting the persistent tug of inflation on household budgets and fueling fears that rising prices, unemployment and interest rates could all worsen in the coming months.
- That pessimism is altering consumers’ spending habits. McDonald’s, Home Depot, Under Armour and Starbucks all recently reported disappointing earnings, as people cut back on fast food, kitchen renovations, sneakers and afternoon lattes. Retail sales were flat in April after decent pickups in February and March. Meanwhile, Walmart reported a strong first quarter this week, nudged upward by high-income shoppers, executives said.
- And gas prices, while easing in recent weeks, are up overall for the year, just ahead of the busy summer season.
- In recent weeks, some of the country’s largest companies have mentioned they are feeling the effects of inflation. At Starbucks, for example, customers are coming in less frequently.
- “We continue to feel the impact of a more cautious consumer,” Starbucks CEO Laxman Narasimhan said in an earnings call last month. “Many customers are being more exacting about where and how they choose to spend their money, particularly with stimulus savings mostly spent.”
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Important Takeaways:
- A majority of Americans think that the U.S. economy is heading in the wrong direction, according to an exclusive poll for Newsweek, with many blaming Joe Biden’s economic agenda—Bidenomics—for it.
- But experts told Newsweek that the U.S. economy is doing relatively well, especially when compared to most other Western economies. The negative outlook on the economy that many Americans hold is likely linked to the fact that the economic picture is objectively complicated and hard to understand right now.
- Their widespread pessimism is reflected in the results of a Redfield & Wilton Strategies poll conducted on behalf of Newsweek on April 11. According to the survey, some 50 percent of Americans believe that the U.S. economy is heading in the wrong direction, while only 25 percent said it is going in the right direction.
- Americans are also negative about their own financial situation. Some 42 percent of respondents said their financial situation has worsened in the last year. Only 26 percent said it has improved, while 32 percent said it has stayed the same.
- Some 47 percent of Americans said they were now financially worse off than they were three years before, against 26 percent who said they were better off and 27 percent who said they were about the same. Some 45 percent said they were now worse off than before the pandemic, while 28 percent said they were better off and 27 percent were about the same.
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Important Takeaways:
- A significant number of small businesses across the nation are struggling to pay rent due to skyrocketing costs, a recent study by business networking platform Alignable found.
- The company’s latest Small Business Rent report, published on Friday, found that 43 percent of small business renters in the U.S. were unable to pay their rent in full and on time in the month of April. Such a high delinquency rate hasn’t been reported in the U.S. since March 2021, at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, when it reached 49 percent.
- The delinquency rate was also four percentage points higher than in March, making it the largest month-over-month surge in over a year, according to data analyzed by Alignable. Newsweek contacted Alignable for comment by email on Tuesday morning.
- The state with the highest delinquency rate in the country was Texas with 52 percent of small business owners unable to pay their rent in full and on time in April, followed by Massachusetts (47 percent), California (46 percent), Maryland (42 percent), New York and Washington State (39 percent). The lowest delinquency rate was in Colorado, with 26 percent.
- Troubles among small businesses is trouble for the entire country’s economy, as small businesses employ nearly half of the entire American workforce, according to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, and represents 43.5 percent of American GDP.
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Important Takeaways:
- Ahead of Easter rush, officials say drought must not put off Barcelona tourists
- Tourists arriving at Barcelona’s airport or gazing at its iconic Sagrada Familia basilica will this Easter holiday be met with large signs in English that read: “Drought alert. During your stay, save water”.
- Reservoir levels are only around 15% of their capacity, prompting curbs on water use by residents, visitors, agriculture and industry. Beach showers are shut and swimming pools cannot be filled with tap water, among other restrictions.
- Catalan officials have appealed for tourists to act responsibly, but are also adamant the drought should not put them off coming to the Spanish city and region most-visited by foreigners, where tourism accounts for 14.5% of the local economy.
- Barcelona’s hotel association warned in February the city could not afford to project an image abroad of hotels with empty pools. Hotels’ lobbying prompted the authorities to relax a total ban on filling pools, allowing desalinated water to be used instead.
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Important Takeaways:
- The typical American household must spend an additional $11,434 annually just to maintain the same standard of living they enjoyed in January of 2021, right before inflation soared to 40-year highs, according to a recent analysis of government data.
- Such figures underscore the financial squeeze many families continue to face even as the rate of U.S. inflation recedes and the economy by many measures remains strong, with the jobless rate at a two-decade low. The analysis, from Republican members of the U.S. Senate Joint Economic Committee, taps government data such as the Consumer Price Index and Consumer Expenditure Survey to examine the impact of inflation state by state.
- Even so, many Americans say they aren’t feeling those gains, and this fall more people reported struggling financially than they did prior to the pandemic, according to CBS News polling. Inflation is the main reason Americans express pessimism about economy despite its bright points, which also include stronger wage gains in recent years.
- The Biden administration called the analysis “flawed.”
- Around the U.S., the state with the highest additional expenditures to afford the same standard of living compared with 2021 is Colorado, where a household must spend an extra $15,000 per year, the JEC analysis found. Residents in Arkansas, meanwhile, have to spend the least to maintain their standard of living, at about $8,500 on an annual basis.
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