Budget and Finance Archives - Page 10 of 13

New Gov’t Data Suggests Biden Admin’s Anti-Gas Appliance Push Could Make Home Heating Way More Expensive

November 13, 2023

By The Daily Caller

Americans using electric heating systems, favored by the Biden administration’s climate agenda, will pay significantly more to keep their homes warm this winter than Americans using natural gas, according to data from the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA).
Those who use electricity to heat their homes will pay $1,063 on average this winter, while Americans using natural gas will pay an average of $601 to keep their homes warm, according to the EIA data.
Attempts to phase out the use of natural gas for home heating and other purposes “would raise costs to consumers, jeopardize environmental progress and deny affordable energy to underserved populations,” American Gas Association President and CEO Karen Harbert told the Daily Caller News Foundation.

Americans who heat their homes with electricity could see costs increase this winter as the Biden administration forges ahead with its broad push to diminish the use of fossil fuels in homes and buildings, according to data from the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA).

Those who rely on electricity to heat their homes will pay an average of $1,063 this upcoming winter, approximately 77% more than Americans using natural gas, who will pay an average of $601 to keep their homes warm, according to the EIA’s projections. The Biden administration, with the encouragement of environmentalist advocacy groups, has proposed regulations and rolled out subsidy programs designed to decrease the use of oil and gas products for home heating and other purposes, citing a perceived need to decrease carbon emissions they generate.

“Natural gas has been one of the principal drivers to achieving our nation’s environmental and economic goals. From providing affordable energy to consumers to driving down emissions, the benefits this fuel has for our nation are tangible and impossible to ignore,” American Gas Association President and CEO Karen Harbert told the Daily Caller News Foundation. Attempts to phase out the use of natural gas for home heating and other uses “would raise costs to consumers, jeopardize environmental progress and deny affordable energy to underserved populations,” she added.

REPORTER:

“We’ve seen them go after gas stoves…how many more home appliances will Americans eventually have to replace?” pic.twitter.com/JgjQyiPGK0

— Daily Caller (@DailyCaller) July 24, 2023

The discrepancy in prices is even more pronounced in the Northeast, where the average cost for using electricity to heat a home is expected to be $1,465, a figure that is about 92% higher than the $761 that natural gas users can expect to pay on average, according to the EIA data.

The effort to change how Americans heat their homes using government action is part of a larger push from the Biden administration to have Americans adopt an array of more efficient, and more expensive, electric appliances in order to fight climate change. As it does on the heating front, the administration uses both regulation, such as its move to phase out gas-powered generators and pool pump motors, and subsidies, like the $2,000 heat pump tax credit from the Inflation Reduction Act, to advance its agenda.

Other appliances the administration has targeted include water heaters, refrigerators and clothes washers. Concurrently, federal agencies, led by the Energy Department, are assisting municipal governments to modify their building codes in ways that limit or ban the use of fossil fuels in new buildings.

Well-funded environmentalist organizations like the Sierra Club and Rewiring America have advocated for the electrification of American homes, and a coalition of 23 state governors has teamed up with the White House to aggressively expand heat pump installations in the effort to reduce the share of Americans relying on natural gas to keep their homes at a comfortable temperature.

The push to electrify home heating and appliances despite their typically higher cost is occurring amid a backdrop of high inflation that is especially hurting the country’s working- and middle-class families.

“The political appointees in the White House, guys like John Podesta, are more interested in helping their big money backers in the green movement than they are in helping provide relief for working-class American families,” Tom Pyle, president of the American Energy Alliance, told the DCNF. “Higher electricity prices don’t hurt wealthy coastal elites, but they crush the poor, seniors and those living on fixed incomes.”

The White House and the Energy Department did not respond to requests for comment.

AUTHOR

NICK POPE

Contributor.

All content created by the Daily Caller News Foundation, an independent and nonpartisan newswire service, is available without charge to any legitimate news publisher that can provide a large audience. All republished articles must include our logo, our reporter’s byline and their DCNF affiliation. For any questions about our guidelines or partnering with us, please contact licensing@dailycallernewsfoundation.org.

Americans Are Increasingly Failing To Make Debt Payments As Inflation Continues To Put ‘Strain On Consumers’

November 12, 2023

By The Daily Caller

Americans are increasingly falling behind on their debt payments as inflation continues to erode real incomes, threatening to cause many consumers to declare bankruptcy.

Delinquency transitions, debts that were previously being paid but no longer are despite outstanding obligations, rose rapidly in the third quarter of 2023 in all forms of debt except for student loans, according to the Federal Reserve Bank of New York. Poor U.S. economic conditions linked to rising inflation and interest rates have left Americans unable to pay for previous obligations that they once could afford, according to experts who spoke to the Daily Caller News Foundation.

“Consumers pay for things three ways: income, savings and credit,” Michael Faulkender, chief economist and senior advisor for the Center for American Prosperity, told the DCNF. “We know that wages have not kept up with inflation over the last 2.5 years and that many households have spent all of the savings accumulated during the pandemic. Therefore, in order to maintain their spending levels, they have been adding to their credit card balances, such that aggregate balances have now eclipsed $1 trillion. Rising credit card debt in a rising interest rate environment with incomes not keeping pace will put more and more households into financial difficulty, resulting in delinquencies.”

Delinquency transitions for credit cards and auto loans saw the biggest increase among debt forms in the third quarter, rising to 8% and 7.4%, respectively, according to the New York Fed. Credit card debt increased to $1.08 trillion in the quarter, rising 4.7% from the second quarter, when it exceeded $1 trillion for the first time in U.S. history.

Real wages for average Americans have declined since President Joe Biden took office, sinking 2.1% from the first quarter of 2021 to the third quarter of 2023, according to the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis. Americans are increasingly turning to their savings to make up the difference in lost wages, with Americans collectively holding $687.7 billion in savings as of September 2023, compared to more than $1 trillion in May and nearly $6 trillion in April 2020.

“It likely indicates that average Americans are not doing well financially,” Jai Kedia, a research fellow for the Center for Monetary and Financial Alternatives at the Cato Institute, told the DCNF. “The quarter-by-quarter increase in delinquencies is probably a signal that the economy is not as good as people thought earlier this year — rather that the hard landing many predicted last year but never came may simply have been delayed.”

An economic soft landing refers to a slowdown in market growth that avoids a recession, as opposed to a hard landing, which would result in a recession, slowing economic growth but also ultimately bringing inflation down. Following the September Federal Open Market Committee meeting, Jerome Powell, chair of the Fed, said a soft landing was not a baseline expectation for the Fed in its fight against inflation.

AUTHOR

Berkshire Hathaway Reports $12.8 Billion Loss Amid Falling Investments

November 6, 2023

By The Daily Caller

Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway reported a substantial loss of nearly $13 billion in the third quarter of the year.

The company disclosed that it lost $12.8 billion, equivalent to $8,824 per Class A share, for the quarter, according to Associated Press (AP). This loss is significantly larger than the $2.8 billion loss, or $1,907 per Class A share, that Berkshire Hathaway reported for the same period last year.

The majority of these losses are unrealized, as Berkshire Hathaway did not sell most of its stocks, with its largest holding being a significant stake in Apple. Accounting rules mandate that the company include the value of its investments in its earnings. At the end of the quarter, Berkshire Hathaway valued its investments at $341.1 billion, a decrease from the previous quarter when it reported a value of $353 billion, the outlet added.

Warren Buffett’s Firm Reports $12.8 Billion Loss as Investments Fall but Its Insurers Performed Wellhttps://t.co/sow5UVweZj pic.twitter.com/XsZXfXgDAK

— The Epoch Times (@EpochTimes) November 4, 2023

Buffett has long emphasized that investors should focus on Berkshire Hathaway’s operating earnings, which exclude the varying value of its investments from quarter to quarter. Berkshire reported that its operating profit surged by nearly 41% to $10.8 billion, or $7,437.15 per Class A share, up from $7.65 billion, or $5,215.60 per Class A share, in the same quarter the previous year.

The company’s overall portfolio spans various industries, including insurance, transportation (BNSF railroad), utilities, and manufacturing and retail firms. The company continues to maintain a significant cash position, with $157.2 billion in cash on hand at the end of the third quarter, up from $147.4 billion at the end of the second quarter, AP further reported.

AUTHOR

MARIANE ANGELA

Contributor.

Total Agency Loan Volume Is Projected to Decline 15-30% From Its Series Low Set in January 2023

October 25, 2023

By Edward Pinto

October 24, 2023/in Budget and Finance, Economy, Hot Topics, News, Policy, Politics, Regulation/by Edward Pinto

By Edward J. Pinto | Tobias Peter | Sissi Li

PDF to full report

Key takeaways:

The median purchase rate rose 1/8 ppts. to 7 5/8% in week 42, setting a new series record.
Mortgage News Daily reported a daily avg. 30-year rate of 7.90% on October 24^th.
Purchase volume was down 46% from the same week in 2019 and down 31% YTD compared to 2019.
Y-o-y HPA was 4.8% in September 2023, up from 4.6% in August 2023 but down from 8.9% in September 2022. It is projected to remain around 5% for October and November 2023.
Despite the subdued rate of purchase activity and historically high rates, y-o-y HPA has begun to accelerate. This is because buyers are well-qualified and highly motivated by a historically tight supply. Cooling, yet still strong job numbers, low levels of foreclosures in most areas, work from home, and continued home price arbitrage opportunities provide further support for robust HPA.
As interest rates have moved sharply higher since mid-2022, no cash-out volume has disappeared almost entirely. Cash-out volume has also contracted sharply due to higher rates, but has hovered between 30,000 to 42,0000 loans since November 2022. This is down over 80% from a peak of 250,000 loans in October 2021.
Up until recently, purchase volume had been less affected by mortgage rate changes but had also shown a clear seasonal pattern over the last 10 years. With the exception of the pandemic disruptions of 2020, volume consistently peaks in June with a trough in January.
For the mortgage industry, things will almost certainly get worse before they get better. We are expecting the total agency loan volume (refi and purchase loans combined) to decrease to 125,000-150,000 by January 2024. This would be a 15%-30% decline from the series low (combined volume of 175,000) set in January 2023.

http://drrich.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/logo_264x69.png 0 0 Edward Pinto http://drrich.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/logo_264x69.png Edward Pinto2023-10-24 18:58:512023-10-24 18:58:51Total Agency Loan Volume Is Projected to Decline 15-30% From Its Series Low Set in January 2023

UN Refugee Fund for Gaza Is Being Used to Finance Terrorism and Anti-Semitism, Experts Say

October 18, 2023

By Family Research Council

In the wake of the atrocities perpetrated by Hamas terrorists that killed over 1,400 Israeli civilians on October 7, increased scrutiny is being centered on the ideology that fueled the barbarity that took place. Experts say that funds allocated to the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA) have not only been funneled to terrorists in Gaza, but have also been used to fund educational materials for Palestinian youth that is rife with anti-Semitism.

UNRWA was established in 1949 by the U.N. General Assembly with the original purpose of aiding the refugees that resulted from the 1948 Arab-Israeli War. Since then, the fund has been renewed almost every year and has grown astronomically to a current annual budget of over $1 billion. The Biden administration contributed $153.7 million in U.S. taxpayer dollars to the fund in June, which the UNRWA commissioner claimed would “help us keep over 700 schools and 140 health centres open over the next months.” For decades, however, the fund has been embroiled in controversy, as reviews of the fund’s expenditures showed that a significant amount of money was going to terror-group affiliates.

In 2018, the Trump administration ended funding for UNRWA due to the corruption that was uncovered. A report found that less than 5% of the population that it funded actually met the original definition of a “refugee.” But as experts have observed, this was only the tip of the iceberg. It was found that a number of the UNRWA staff working in Gaza had personal ties to terrorism and that “UNRWA schools in Gaza have been used by Hamas to launch rockets against Israel.”

What has become particularly distressing to observers is how the money is being used to fund schools that indoctrinate Palestinian youth to hate Israel and the Jewish people. On Monday, Itamar Marcus, founder and director of Palestinian Media Watch, joined “Washington Watch with Tony Perkins” to discuss the situation.

“Our first report on Palestinian schoolbooks … was in 1998, and they were filled with poison,” he explained. “At that time … [an] American representative said, ‘I read this material and I wanted to vomit.’ It’s just unimaginable.’ Americans condemned it then, and the United States continued funding the Palestinian Authority year after year after year, knowing what was happening already then.

Marcus continued, “[W]e did a report in 2007, which I decided to release in the Senate, and I turned to Hillary Clinton. I wanted a Democrat … someone who would [not] be automatically pro-Israel. And she appeared at a press conference with me … [and] said, ‘The Palestinians are profoundly poisoning the minds of their children.’ And that was 2007. I call the Palestinians who are running through the streets today murdering Israelis, the Hamas, as well as the Palestinian Authority, Fatah people, the mainstream. They are the poisoned generation. They were brought up on hate, on demonization. And that’s what we have today.”

Marcus went on to describe the specific beliefs that have been espoused by religious authorities in Gaza.

“Mahmoud Abbas is the head of the Palestinian Authority — he’s seen as the moderate,” he noted. “He has a personal adviser on Islam … name[ed] Mahmoud al-Habash. He went on TV and he said that the Jews have been the enemies of Islam since the beginning of time, literally since the time of Adam. … [He also said] when you see a Jew, it actually might be Satan in the form of a human. … He literally said that the Jews are subhuman. [He also] said that the Jews are humanoids — creatures that Allah created in the form of humans but aren’t really humans. So you’ve got the top religious figure in the Palestinian Authority [saying] that Jews are actually subhuman, either Satan or animals, but they’re humanoids, so of course you can kill them.”

Marcus also pointed out that Palestinian textbooks for schoolchildren include quotes from a hadith (an Islamic tradition attributed to Muhammad) that commands Muslims to kill Jews, and that TV programs owned and controlled by the Palestinian Authority teach children similar lessons. “Children have said they’ve learned in school to hate the Jews and kill them,” he noted. “We’ve had many, many chants and children’s programs where they talk about the Jews being the descendants of apes and pigs. … And one of the worst things that they’ve taught these kids is that they should go out and die for Allah, that if they [fight] against Jews and they’re killed, that’s the best thing that can happen to them.”

Perkins further wondered if peace is possible when Palestinian youth are taught that Israel has no right to exist.

“They deny Israel the right to exist as a state, and they deny Jews the right to exist as individuals,” Marcus somberly emphasized. “Those two together make peace impossible.”

AUTHOR

Dan Hart

Dan Hart is senior editor at The Washington Stand.

The Washington Stand is Family Research Council’s outlet for news and commentary from a biblical worldview. The Washington Stand is based in Washington, D.C. and is published by FRC, whose mission is to advance faith, family, and freedom in public policy and the culture from a biblical worldview. We invite you to stand with us by partnering with FRC.

‘Simple Econ 101’: Here’s How California’s E-Truck Push Could Hamstring The American Economy

October 2, 2023

By The Daily Caller

California’s push to electrify the heavy-duty trucking fleet in the state is likely to hurt independent trucking operators and drive up costs for goods across the entire American economy, experts on California policy and the trucking industry told the Daily Caller News Foundation.
California will ban the sale of new diesel-powered heavy-duty trucks starting in 2036, and trucking companies that move products between state’s ports and distribution hubs will not be allowed to register new diesel trucks with the state starting in 2024, according to the California Air Resources Board (CARB).
The state’s policies will require more trucks “to haul the same amount of freight” and “have a real impact on the supply chain and the cost and reliability of transportation for the goods that consumers depend on every day,” Jeremy Kirkpatrick, a spokesperson for the American Trucking Association, told the DCNF.

California’s push to transition diesel trucks to electric models in the coming years is likely to damage the state’s trucking industry as well as the larger American economy, experts on California policy and the trucking industry told the Daily Caller News Foundation.

California law will ban the sale of new diesel-powered heavy-duty trucks in the state starting in 2036, and trucking companies that move products between the state’s ports and distribution hubs will not be allowed to register new diesel trucks starting in 2024, according to the California Air Resources Board (CARB). The policies could drive up costs for operators and consumers, an outcome that would hurt the overall U.S. economy, given that California’s 12 ports handle approximately 40% of all imported containers to the U.S. and 30% of all of its shipping container exports, according to the California Legislative Analyst’s Office.

“There are serious issues with range and charge times, operability in cold weather environments and reduced payloads because of the battery weight,” Jeremy Kirkpatrick, a spokesperson for the American Trucking Association, told the DCNF. “That means more trucks will be needed to haul the same amount of freight. All of this will have a real impact on the supply chain and the cost and reliability of transportation for the goods that consumers depend on every day.”

The state’s policies effectively mandate that nearly all of the state’s freight hauling, package delivery and box trucks would be zero-emission vehicles by no later than 2045, according to the office of Democratic California Gov. Gavin Newsom. Without incentives, electric trucks are nearly three times more expensive up front than a diesel powered rig, according to the Environmental and Energy Study Institute.

VP HARRIS: “When we invest in clean energy and electric vehicles and reduce population, more of our children can breath clean air and drink clean water.” pic.twitter.com/yhZzDmkeAM

— Daily Caller (@DailyCaller) July 14, 2023

The Inflation Reduction Act (IRA), President Joe Biden’s signature climate bill, provides incentives that can cover about $40,000 of the overall cost of electric trucks, which have an average cost of about $400,000, according to the International Council on Clean Transportation.

“Electric trucks in particular have limited range based on numerous factors (weight, outside air temperature, etc.), and many cannot operate much over 250 miles before needing to be recharged (diesels can operate well over 1,000 miles depending on fuel tank size),” Joe Rajkovacz, director of governmental affairs and communications for the Western States Trucking Association, told the DCNF. “The recharging times (supposing there are sufficient charging points), can take hours, not minutes as with diesel. This takes away significantly from the hours of service drivers are allowed daily under both state and federal regulations.”

“As trucks time out, many will not be replaced, reducing the required number of available trucks to California ports and rail yards,” Rajkovacz continued. “It is simple Econ 101; when a shortage hits, prices go up.”

California’s policies on truck emissions are the strictest in the nation and are oriented around the state’s goal to achieve an overall emissions reduction of 85% by 2045, according to Newsom’s office.

“These vehicles are far more expensive and cost-prohibitive for most truckers,” Kirkpatrick told the DCNF. He added that “96% of trucking companies in this country are small businesses operating ten trucks or fewer. The charging infrastructure is nowhere near in place, and even if it was, there’s not electricity on the grid to power the fleet.”

There were less than 700 electric truck chargers across the entire state as of July, and the state estimates that more than 150,000 new chargers will be required in order to power the fleet of the future, according to The Wall Street Journal. California’s grid already struggles to comfortably meet periods of peak demand, as the state’s grid operator issued “Flex Alerts” over a 10-day period in September 2022 urging residents to turn up their thermostats during the late afternoon and evening hours to conserve energy amid a heatwave.

The potential problems of an electrified trucking fleet will not be exclusive to California, as eight other states have opted into at least some of California’s rules for truck emissions. Those states are Oregon, Washington, Colorado, New Jersey, New York, Maryland, Massachusetts and Vermont, according to CARB.

“There are new technologies coming fast and mandating pure electric vehicles closes off innovation and creates obsolete trucks within a few years,” Edward Ring, senior fellow for the California Policy Center. told the DCNF. “Meanwhile, our entire fleet gets sidelined and countless independent truckers are wiped out.”

AUTHOR

NICK POPE

Contributor

RELATED ARTICLES:

‘Americans Had Better Wake Up’: Biden Admin Fires Next Regulatory Salvo In Its Push For EVs

Unintended Consequences: The California Electric Truck Mandate

The US Is Starting To Feel The Pain Of Years Of Massive Deficit Spending

RELATED TWEET:

You can’t make this up.🤡 pic.twitter.com/mzt1LfxETm

— Dr. Anastasia Maria Loupis (@DrLoupis) October 1, 2023

All content created by the Daily Caller News Foundation, an independent and nonpartisan newswire service, is available without charge to any legitimate news publisher that can provide a large audience. All republished articles must include our logo, our reporter’s byline and their DCNF affiliation. For any questions about our guidelines or partnering with us, please contact licensing@dailycallernewsfoundation.org.

‘A Hit Job On Michigan And On Detroit’: Trump Calls Biden EV Push A ‘Government Assassination’ Of Auto Jobs

September 28, 2023

By The Daily Caller

Former President Donald Trump ripped President Joe Biden’s push for electric vehicles, calling it a “hit job” on Detroit and the auto industry.

Trump spoke in Clinton Township, Michigan, to a crowd of union workers instead of attending a debate at the Reagan Presidential Library in Simi Valley, California, that aired on Fox Business Network Wednesday. Trump currently leads a 42.2% lead over Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida among Republican primary voters in the Real Clear Politics average of polls from Sept. 14 though September 26, drawing 56.6% of the vote, compared to 14.4% for the Florida governor.

WATCH:

“Biden’s mandate isn’t a government regulation. It’s a government assassination of your jobs and of your industry. The auto industry is being assassinated, and it makes no difference what you get,” Trump told those attending the speech. “I don’t care what you get in the next two weeks or three weeks or five weeks, they’re gonna be closing up and they’re going to be building those cars in China and other places. It’s a hit job on Michigan and on Detroit.”

The UAW walked off the job at three auto manufacturing plants in Ohio, Michigan and Missouri at midnight Sept. 15, after failing to reach an agreement with Ford, General Motors and Stellantis (formerly Chrysler). The union sought a four-day work week and a 36% salary increase over five years, according to Bloomberg.

“But on the electric vehicles, this year to comply with the mandate, a sixty thousand loss. They’re gonna lose sixty thousand dollars for every car produced. That sounds like a great deal, but honestly, for UAW and for auto workers and for everybody and for the country, it’s not sustainable,” Trump said.

Biden signed the Inflation Reduction Act, which spends $370 billion to combat climate change, into law in August 2022. The legislation is loaded with green energy provisions, including a $7,500 tax credit for electric vehicles.

Despite Biden’s push for electric vehicles, the Biden administration blocked efforts to start mining for copper and nickel near the Boundary Waters Canoe Area in January, the Wall Street Journal reported. In addition, the Environmental Protection Agency made a determination Jan. 31 that would block the mining of 1.4 billion tons of copper, gold, molybdenum, silver and rhenium in Alaska in order to protect salmon.

AUTHOR

HAROLD HUTCHISON

Reporter.

RELATED ARTICLES:

‘Workers Of America Are Getting Screwed’: Here’s What To Expect From Trump’s Visit To Detroit On Debate Night

‘You Can’t Blame Them’: Former Trump Official Tells Viewers To ‘Think Twice’ Before Bashing UAW Over Strike

‘Wipe Us Out’: Striking UAW Workers Rip Biden’s Push To Force Americans Into EVs

E-Buses Bought From Now-Bankrupt Manufacturer By Blue Enclave Are Now All Out Of Commission

RELATED TWEET:

Don’t ever forget how Joe Biden actually feels about working class Americans.

What kind of elected leader talks to voters that way? pic.twitter.com/mDPzZ7l9G1

— Ted Cruz (@tedcruz) September 27, 2023

All content created by the Daily Caller News Foundation, an independent and nonpartisan newswire service, is available without charge to any legitimate news publisher that can provide a large audience. All republished articles must include our logo, our reporter’s byline and their DCNF affiliation. For any questions about our guidelines or partnering with us, please contact licensing@dailycallernewsfoundation.org.

BIDENOMICS: China Dumps Nearly $500 Billion in U.S. Bonds

September 24, 2023

By Dr. Rich Swier

Countries continue divesting from U.S. Treasury Bonds.

World’s second-largest economy offloaded US$13.6 billion worth of US debt in July

But China still remains the second-largest foreign holder of US Treasury bills, having been surpassed by Japan in mid-2019

By: Frank Chen, South China · Post 19 Sep, 2023

Amid persistent concerns over the safety of its overseas assets – most of which are US dollar-denominated – China has slashed its holdings of United States Treasury bills for the fourth straight month.

[..]

The world’s second-largest economy offloaded US$13.6 billion worth of US debt in July, bringing China’s holdings to US$821.8 billion, according to the latest data from the US Department of the Treasury.
China’s overall holding of US debt remains at a 14-year low, after reaching that level in June.

Beijing has been continuously cutting China’s US debt holdings since early 2022, with two exceptions – in March of this year and July 2022, when it increased holdings by US$20.3 billion and US$320 million, respectively.

Beijing remains the second-largest foreign holder of US Treasury bills after being surpassed by Japan in June 2019.

The reduction in US Treasury bills holdings between March 2022 and this past July – China dumped US$191.4 billion, Japan slashed US$116.5 billion, Ireland cut US$44.4 billion, Brazil shed US$8.6 billion and Singapore got rid of US$4.8 billion – was partly because of the slew of aggressive US interest rate hikes that have dampened bond prices.

Keep reading.

AUTHOR

Pamela Geller

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BIDENOMICS: August Bankruptcies Spike, 2023 Highest on Record

Biden Cripples Auto Industry, UAW Announces Major Strike, Attacks…Trump

There’s an Easy Fix That Would Solve Our Housing Crisis: Light Touch Density

September 21, 2023

By Edward Pinto

We’re living through one of the greatest housing crunches the U.S. has ever known. It’s resulted in record numbers of homelessness and entire generations certain they will never become homeowners, that critical milestone of the middle class. But there is a simple solution to the problem. The answer to our housing crisis is to legalize duplexes, triplexes, and other forms of light-touch density (LTD) housing, allowing the market to build more affordable housing options for more Americans.

The reason this is the solution to our housing crisis is simple: It increases the supply of housing for middle-income households, when what we have now is the opposite—long-standing exclusionary zoning laws that limit most areas of the nation to single-family detached homes, banning LTD homes.

LTD housing can take many forms: duplexes, triplexes, quads through eight-plexes, townhouses, cottage courts, accessory dwelling units, and other similar structure types. By allowing more units on a single parcel of land, LTD is both naturally affordable and naturally inclusionary, creating upward mobility naturally through a more accessible housing market. All it takes is repealing the laws that ban it.

This is already happening across the nation. California, Austin, and Vermont have each passed legislation entitled HOME. In California, it stands for Housing Opportunity and More Efficiency; in Austin, Home Options for Middle-Income Empowerment, and in Vermont, Housing Opportunities Made for Everyone. What these and other enactments have in common is a recognition that the solution to our nation’s worsening housing crunch is to repeal zoning laws that only allow the building of single family detached housing.

How did we end up with such laws? If you look back over the first 70 years of the 20th century, housing was generally abundant and affordable to people of all classes, though racial and ethnic segregation was of course rampant. As renowned planner John Nolan observed in 1917, building a range of housing types on varying lot sizes helps to ensure that new housing could be built that wage earners could afford. For example, in New England in 1940, duplexes, triple deckers, and four-plexes comprised one-third of the region’s housing stock and offered naturally affordable housing to the masses. Boarding homes were common as homeowners could help pay their mortgage by letting out rooms for a small fee (much like Airbnb today). For newcomers or those who had fallen on hard times, single-room occupancy buildings around bus and train stations provided a safety net in the form of cheap short-term housing. In 1970, even San Francisco was affordable.

But the economic inclusiveness and the threat of racial integration that came with these housing variations also posed a potential threat to the status quo—one that proved to be unbearable to certain segments of our government that were invested in segregation. They realized that zoning laws could be used to raise prices and rents, making homes unaffordable to Blacks, Jews, and Eastern and Southern Europeans. At the encouragement of the U.S. Commerce Department, states and municipalities started to adopt zoning laws in the 1920s, which restricted most of the nation’s residential land to more expensive single-family detached homes, while outlawing or excluding other, more affordable housing options.

These zoning policies ultimately replaced private property rights with vague and nebulous communal rights—think of the Not-In-My-Backyard or NIMBY movement—and the opinions of city planners. In so doing, they made homes and land scarce and expensive. In short, land use regulations prevented the market from building more housing, especially in high-demand places where people with well-paying jobs lived.

With the market constrained, demand eventually started to outstrip supply in high-demand cities. Home prices started to rise faster than incomes, leading to increased unaffordability. Across the country, once-affordable neighborhoods gradually priced out existing residents and potential newcomers; high prices make even older, smaller homes unaffordable to moderate-income buyers and renters.

Nowhere is this trend more visible than in California, which had home prices relative to incomes that was about on par with the national average in the 1970s. Since then, a booming economy coupled with restrictive land use regulations gave bureaucrats and NIMBYs the ability to delay for years or even stop the market from responding to any additional demand. Today, California’s home prices relative to incomes are about double the rest of the country.

To tackle today’s housing crunch, we need to build more housing to undo the damage done by misguided zoning policies. The key is to return to the light-touch density housing types of the early 20th Century.

By implementing by-right LTD across the country, an estimated 930,000 additional housing units could be created annually (depending on the maximum allowed density) over the next 30 to 40 years. This moderate density increase would expand the construction of more naturally affordable and inclusionary housing, thereby keeping home prices more aligned with incomes and keeping housing displacement pressures low.

Houston is an example of how a city can experience rapid population and wage growth and not sacrifice affordability. In 1998, as reported by Zillow, mid-tier home prices nationally and for the Houston metro were the same, while Los Angeles’ metro’s homes were 76 percent above the national level. Houston implemented a LTD law authorizing much smaller lots in 1998. By 2023, homes in the Houston metro area were 13 percent below the national level, while Los Angeles’ had risen to 160 percent above the national level. This goes a long way toward explaining why LA’s homeless rate in 2021 was 11 times that of Houston’s.

Rather than disciplined, knowledge-based policy solutions, others choose the path of scapegoating investment firms that buy up single-family homes for their unaffordability. But this reasoning fundamentally misdiagnoses the problem. While it’s true that such investor purchases have recently increased, this narrative ignores the fact that the rise in home prices long pre-dates this trend. Moreover, 50 percent of the purchases of single-family homes were made by people who own less than 10 homes, in other words, mom and pop investors. Just 10 percent are owned by mega-investors with 1,000 properties or more, as CoreLogic pointed out.

This is all cause for optimism. Knowledge based solutions are prevailing. States such as California, Washington, Oregon, Vermont, and Montana and cities such as Austin, Minneapolis, and Charlotte have also already passed reforms scaling back single-family detached zoning laws and legalizing LTD zoning. Many more jurisdictions are considering similar reforms.

Legalizing light-touch density is the most effective and politically palatable way to solve our housing crisis. LTD zoning unleashes the private sector to close the housing supply gap and provide more housing opportunities and affordable homes for more Americans.

Originally appeared in Newsweek

AUTHOR

Edward J. Pinto

Senior Fellow and Codirector, AEI Housing Center.

RELATED ARTICLE: Prevalence of GSE Appraisal Waivers

Inflation Surges Above Expectations Despite Fed’s Rate Hikes

September 13, 2023

By The Daily Caller

Inflation rose significantly in August, marking the second month in a row that inflation has ticked up, according to the latest Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) release on Wednesday.

The Consumer Price Index (CPI), a broad measure of the prices of everyday goods, increased 3.7% on an annual basis in August, compared to 3.2% in July, according to the BLS. Core CPI, which excludes the volatile categories of energy and food, remained high, rising 4.3% year-over-year in August, compared to 4.7% in July.

“This will be the second acceleration in a row, showing that inflation is anything but dead,” E.J. Antoni, a research fellow at the Heritage Foundation’s Grover M. Hermann Center for the Federal Budget, told the Daily Caller News Foundation. “Although we’ve been told that inflation has been trending back towards 2%, that’s false. If anything, the annualized monthly data show it was trending towards 3% and is now climbing again.”

The rise in inflation was partly driven by an increase in the price of gasoline, accounting for half of the total gain, with the energy index rising 5.6% for the month. The second largest contributor to the increase was the price of shelter, which has risen for the past 40 months in a row.

The Federal Reserve, in an attempt to lower inflation, has raised its federal funds rate to the highest point since 2001 after a series of 11 rate hikes, bringing the current rate to a range of 5.25% and 5.50%. The Fed will announce on Sept. 20 whether it will raise rates again at the conclusion of its Federal Open Market Committee meeting.

Real median household income down 2.3% in 2022; poverty level and rate were flat Y/Y; supplemental poverty measure jumped 4.6 percentage points: pic.twitter.com/e30ns3jrBL

— E.J. Antoni, Ph.D. (@RealEJAntoni) September 12, 2023

Jerome Powell, chair of the Fed, hinted in August at the Jackson Hole Economic Symposium that the Fed will raise rates if factors like high inflation, a hot labor market and sustained growth continue.

The job market has cooled in recent months, with August only adding 187,000 new nonfarm payroll jobs. The number of jobs added for June and July were both revised down to reflect further softening, adding 80,000 and 30,000 fewer than was previously reported, respectively.

GDP grew less than previously thought for the second quarter of 2023, with the economy growing 2.1% instead of the 2.4% that was originally reported.

“I expect the Fed will continue with a combination of pauses and 25-basis-point hikes for several more months, while continuing to slowly run off the balance sheet,” Antoni told the DCNF. “To put the inflation of the last two and a half years in perspective, roughly all of the household net wealth generated over that time has been confiscated by the government through the hidden tax of inflation.”

AUTHOR

WILL KESSLER

Contributor.

All content created by the Daily Caller News Foundation, an independent and nonpartisan newswire service, is available without charge to any legitimate news publisher that can provide a large audience. All republished articles must include our logo, our reporter’s byline and their DCNF affiliation. For any questions about our guidelines or partnering with us, please contact licensing@dailycallernewsfoundation.org.

Share of U.S. Born Men in the Labor Force Declined Dramatically Since the 1960s

August 31, 2023

By Dr. Rich Swier

The following study is from the Center for Immigration Studies that looks at the decades-long decline in labor force participation among the U.S. born men and women and its implications for immigration policy.

Working-Age, but Not Working in California

Share of U.S.-born men in the labor force declined dramatically since the 1960s

Washington, D.C. (August 31, 2023) – A new analysis of government data by the Center for Immigration Studies shows the dramatic decline in the labor force participation of working-age U.S.-born men over the past six decades nationally and in California, particularly for men without a bachelor’s degree. One of the arguments for allowing in so many immigrants is that the low unemployment rate means that no potential workers are available. But this ignores the massive increase in the number of working-age (16 to 64) people not in the labor force in states like California who do not show up as unemployed because they are not actively looking for work.

“There is consensus that the enormous decline in labor force participation in states like California is contributing to serious problems such as social isolation, drug addiction, and crime,” said Steven Camarota, the Center’s Director of Research and lead author of the report. “It seems very unlikely we will ever address this issue if immigration remains high and businesses can simply turn to immigrant workers to fill jobs.”

Among the Findings:

The labor force participation rate of working-age (16 to 64) U.S.-born men in California fell from 91 percent in 1960 to 82 percent by 2000 and was just 75 percent in April of this year.
Among U.S.-born women (16 to 64) in California, 68 percent were in the labor force in April 2023, down some from the 70 percent in 2000. The labor force participation of U.S.-born women California was traditionally much lower than men’s, but increased dramatically after 1960, peaking in 2000 and remaining roughly the same since.
Research shows the fall-off in labor force participation is associated with profound social problems such as overdose deaths, crime, suicide, and welfare dependency — to say nothing of the fiscal and economic damage.
At the same time that the labor force participation rate of the U.S.-born was falling, the immigrant share of the overall labor force in the state tripled from 11 percent in 1960 to 34 percent in 2023.
Working-age immigrant men in California have not experienced the same decline in their labor force participation, though the rate did decline from 91 percent to 87 percent between 1960 and 2000, it has changed little since 2000.

Among Men Without a Bachelor’s Degree:

The participation rate of U.S.-born men (16 to 64) in California without a bachelor’s fell from 90 percent in 1960, to 78 percent in 2000, to just 68 percent in 2023.
The participation rate of “prime age” (25 to 54) U.S.-born men in the state without a bachelor’s declined from 97 percent in 1960, to 89 percent in 2000, to just 81 percent in 2023.
While the overall participation rate of U.S.-born women (16 to 64) overall has changed relatively little since 2000 in California, the rate for U.S.-born women without a bachelor’s declined significantly from 67 percent in 2000 to 60 percent by 2023.

CLICK HERE TO READ THE FULL REPORT.

Chinese Parent Behind Company Building Michigan Battery Plants Employs 923 CCP Members

August 31, 2023

By The Daily Caller

The Chinese parent company of Gotion Inc., which intends to build two electric battery plants in Michigan, employs 923 Chinese Communist Party (CCP) members, including its CEO, according to its 2022 ESG report.

The Fremont, California-based Gotion Inc. — which is “wholly owned and controlled” by Gotion High-Tech Power Energy Co., according to a Foreign Agents Registration Act filing — seeks to “invest $2.4 billion to construct two 550,000-square-foot production plants” for electric vehicle (EV) batteries in Big Rapids, Michigan, Fox News reported.

Michigan Democratic Gov. Gretchen Whitmer supports Gotion’s plan, and the Biden administration approved the project in June. However, some Republicans have raised red flags over Gotion’s CCP ties through its parent company Gotion High-Tech.

While Gotion Inc.’s representatives deny CCP influence, Chinese-language documents show its Hefei-based parent company is led by a CCP member and employs hundreds more of them.

“Gotion High-Tech founded a CCP branch in 2010 that was upgraded to a CCP committee in 2014,” reads Gotion High-Tech’s 2022 ESG Report. “The CCP committee’s subunits are two CCP general branches and 11 party branches, currently with 923 CCP members, among which over 50% hold master’s degrees or higher.”

Gotion High-Tech’s CEO, Li Zhen, is also identified as the party secretary for the firm’s CCP committee within a section of the 2022 ESG report highlighting the company’s 2022 “party building work situation.”

“The company’s party secretary for its CCP committee, chairman of the board of directors, Li Zhen, led a portion of CCP member representatives, company leader groups and every level of core personnel on a road trip to Anhui province’s Jinzhai Revolutionary Martyr’s Memorial Tower, to tour the Red Army Memorial Hall and Jinzhai Revolutionary Museum,” the firm’s ESG report states.

View Hefei Gotion2022 ESG Report

Questions about Gotion’s CCP-ties arose after The Midwesterner reported that Gotion High-Tech’s “Articles of Association” state that: “The Company shall set up a Party organization and carry out Party activities in accordance with the Constitution of the Communist Party of China. The Company shall ensure necessary conditions for carrying out Party activities. The secretary of the Party committee shall be the chairman.”

In August 2023, Politico reported that Gotion’s North American manufacturing vice president Chuck Thelen criticized those who cited this language in the China-based parent company’s Articles of Association.

Thelen, Politico reported, has insisted that there is no such language in the U.S.-based company’s articles of incorporation. Thelen said the Chinese Communist Party has no presence in the North American company.

“‘The rumors that you’ve heard about us bringing communism to North America are just flat-out fear-mongering and really have nothing based in reality,’” Politico quoted Thelen as saying.

Likewise, an unnamed spokesperson for Gotion told Fox News: “Gotion Inc. makes it very clear in the [Foreign Agents Registration Act] filing that it is not supervised, directed, controlled or financed by any foreign government or foreign political party. … It’s unequivocally spelled out in the FARA document.”

However, lawmakers remain concerned, given that Gotion’s proposed Michigan battery plant will “be located within 60 miles of military armories and 100 miles from Camp Grayling, the country’s largest U.S. National Guard training facility,” Fox News reported.

Camp Grayling occupies 148,000 acres and hosts live-fire combat training exercises, according to its website.

Gotion did not respond to multiple requests for comment.

Li Zhen could not be reached for comment.

AUTHOR

PHILIP LENCZYCKI

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‘Grandest Wager’: China Expert Says Biden’s Soft Stance Has Been Tried Before, Only Made Country More Hostile To US

Company Building EV Battery Factory Near US Military Installations Listed As Chinese Principal, Filings Show

All content created by the Daily Caller News Foundation, an independent and nonpartisan newswire service, is available without charge to any legitimate news publisher that can provide a large audience. All republished articles must include our logo, our reporter’s byline and their DCNF affiliation. For any questions about our guidelines or partnering with us, please contact licensing@dailycallernewsfoundation.org.

VIDEO: The Global War on Farming—Control the Food, Control the People

August 24, 2023

By Matthys van Raalten

Dutch legal philosopher Mrs. Eva Vlaardingerbroek spoke recently at an American farmers convention. Her speech should be seen as a warning for the U.S.

It’s a very good speech about what’s the situation for Dutch farmers right now, what is coming to America, and with excellent questions of the American farmers at the end.

WATCH: “The Global War on Farming: Control the Food, Control the People” Eva Vlaardingerbroek, Dutch farmers advocate and international political commentator.

Sponsored by: Callicrate Banders/No-Bull Enterprises, Colorado Independent Cattlegrowers Association, Kenzy Backgrounding , MW Cattle Co., Bob Baker, Sullivan Ranch, Solid Foundation Ranch, Hyde Farm, Hemmert Ranch, First Northern Bank of Wyoming, Cattle Country Video (Torrington Livestock)

Interest Rate Hikes Fail To Pump The Brakes As Inflation Rises

August 12, 2023

By The Daily Caller

Inflation rose in July after steadily declining from a high of 9.1% in June 2022, according to the latest Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) release on Thursday.

The Consumer Price Index (CPI), a broad measure of the prices of everyday goods like energy and food, increased 3.2% on an annual basis in July, compared to 3.0% in June, according to the BLS. Core CPI, which excludes the volatile categories of energy and food, remained high, rising 4.7% year-over-year in July, compared to 4.8% in June.

“Inflation has become much more ingrained in the economy than the White House, Congress, or the Fed want to admit,” E.J. Antoni, a research fellow at the Heritage Foundation’s Grover M. Hermann Center for the Federal Budget, told the Daily Caller News Foundation. “Combined with slowing economic growth, we have the perfect recipe for stagflation.”

The largest contributor to the increase was shelter, which rose 0.4% for the month of July and contributed to over 90% of the total increase in inflation, according to the BLS.

The Federal Reserve, in an attempt to slow inflation, raised interest rates for the 11th time since March 2022 in July, bringing the Fed’s federal funds target rate within a range of 5.25% and 5.50%. The rate is the highest since 2001.

Fed Chair Jerome Powell remarked after the July Federal Open Market Committee meeting that he did not believe that the inflation rate would return to the normal level of 2% until 2025. He noted that interest rates will be lowered before the inflation rate reaches that level.

Aug is off to a great start – financial conditions loosen even further…
Is it going to take another banking crisis to get us to where we need to be? pic.twitter.com/BsbtjplwtB

— EJ Antoni (@RealEJAntoni) August 9, 2023

“I think Powell is right when he says inflation will not return to 2 percent until 2025,” Antoni told the DCNF. “The Fed under his chairmanship simply doesn’t happen the stomach to fight inflation. Given today’s interest rates and current economic conditions, the Fed’s balance sheet is about $5.3 trillion too big. Powell lacks the will to sell off that much in assets.”

The U.S. added 187,000 jobs for the month of July, 13,000 fewer than economists expected, and the unemployment rate fell to 3.5%. The number of jobs for the months of June and May was revised down by a cumulative 49,000 jobs.

The U.S. economy grew at a rate of 2.4% in the second quarter of 2023, surprising economists who anticipated a more modest expansion of 2%.

AUTHOR

WILL KESSLER

Contributor.

RELATED ARTICLES:

‘Inflation Tax’ Is Higher Than Federal Income Tax

Biden’s Burdensome Regulations Are Contributing To Lackluster Economic Productivity, Experts Say

All content created by the Daily Caller News Foundation, an independent and nonpartisan newswire service, is available without charge to any legitimate news publisher that can provide a large audience. All republished articles must include our logo, our reporter’s byline and their DCNF affiliation. For any questions about our guidelines or partnering with us, please contact licensing@dailycallernewsfoundation.org.

‘Inflation Tax’ Is Higher Than Federal Income Tax

August 12, 2023

By The Daily Caller

Americans are paying far more to offset the costs of inflation since President Joe Biden took office than they pay toward federal income taxes, according to data calculated by the Daily Caller News Foundation.

Average hourly earnings rose from $33.60 per hour in June to $33.74 per hour in July, but when adjusted for inflation since the beginning of Biden’s term as president in January 2021, real wages have failed to keep up, resulting in $4.62 less per hour when adjusted, according to data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics and calculated by E.J. Antoni, a research fellow at the Heritage Foundation’s Grover M. Hermann Center for the Federal Budget. At the average hourly rate for Americans of $33.60, workers pay $3.08 per hour in federal income taxes, far less than what inflation has cost the average worker, according to data calculated by the DCNF.

“Bidenomics can be defined by government spending, borrowing, and printing too much money,” Antoni told the DCNF. “That’s also the recipe for inflation, so the Biden administration’s policies are directly to blame for the inflation tax, a clear violation of Mr. Biden’s promise not to raise taxes on those making less than $400,000 a year.”

“But this is ultimately about policy, and not politics,” Antoni continued. “Plenty of congressional Republicans voted for excessive spending over the last three years and must share some of the blame for our current stagflation. Notwithstanding that fact, Biden is clearly the bigger sinner here, constantly pushing for more spending and driving the nation’s finances into the ground.”

First the headlines:
CPI: Y/Y 3.2%, M/M 0.2%
Core: Y/Y 4.7% (over twice Fed’s target), M/M 0.2%
Inflation has outpaced wage growth almost every month of Biden’s presidency, barely eking out growth in Jul: pic.twitter.com/RcYkmzOEYt

— EJ Antoni (@RealEJAntoni) August 10, 2023

Inflation rose to 3.2% year-over-year in July, up from 3.0% in June after steadily declining from a high of 9.1% in June 2022. The largest contributor to that increase was shelter, which rose 0.4% for the month of July, totaling 90% of the increase in inflation.

“The Federal Reserve, which plans and executes US monetary policy, is responsible for the destruction of real wages since 2020,” Peter Earle, economist at the American Institute for Economic Research, told the DCNF. “The Federal Reserve’s massively expansionary policies throughout 2020 had far-reaching consequences. The winnowing of the dollar’s purchasing power is being felt by every citizen, but hits the poor and individuals on a fixed income far worse than most others.”

The Federal Reserve hiked its federal funds rate for the eleventh time since March 2022 in July, bringing the target rate within a range of 5.25% and 5.50%, the highest rate since 2001. Following the rate hike at the Federal Open Market Committee meeting, Fed Chair Jerome Powell remarked that inflation will not return to the target rate of 2% until 2025.

“Inflation is fundamentally a tax because it is a transfer of wealth from you to the government,” Antoni told the DCNF. “You continue paying that inflation tax until your wages catch up to inflation. At that point, your cumulative lost purchasing power will be equal to how much the government implicitly confiscated from you through inflation.”

AUTHOR

WILL KESSLER

Contributor.

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Ron DeSantis Needs To Go Full Andrew Jackson On The Federal Reserve

All content created by the Daily Caller News Foundation, an independent and nonpartisan newswire service, is available without charge to any legitimate news publisher that can provide a large audience. All republished articles must include our logo, our reporter’s byline and their DCNF affiliation. For any questions about our guidelines or partnering with us, please contact licensing@dailycallernewsfoundation.org.

BIDENOMICS: American Credit Card Debt Soars Past $1 Trillion

August 10, 2023

By The Geller Report

No one an afford anything. Ain’t it grand, proles?

US credit card debt surges to more than $1 trillion for first time ever

By Ariel Zilber

The credit card debt held by US shoppers surpassed more than $1 trillion for the first time ever as high inflation continues to drive up costs, according to a report published on Tuesday by the New York Federal Reserve.

Credit card balances grew by $45 billion in the second quarter of this year — rising from $986 billion at the end of the first quarter to $1.03 trillion by the end of the most recent three-month period, the New York Fed data shows.

“One trillion dollars in credit card debt is staggering,” Matt Schulz, chief credit analyst at LendingTree, told Fox Business.

“Unfortunately, it is likely only going to keep growing from here. What’s driving it is inflation, higher interest rates and just generally how expensive life is in 2023.”

The report found that Americans held a total of 578.35 million credit card accounts — a 5.48 million increase from the end of the first quarter.

The credit card limits increased on aggregate by $9 billion to $4.6 trillion, according to the New York Fed.

Read more.

Americans’ credit card debt hits a record $1 trillion

By Alicia Wallace, Minneapolis CNN

Americans’ credit card debt levels have just notched a new, but undesirable, milestone: For the first time ever, they’ve surpassed $1 trillion, according to data released Tuesday by the Federal Reserve Bank of New York.

During the second quarter, credit card balances shot up by $45 billion, or nearly 4.6%, to land at $1.03 trillion, according to the New York Fed’s latest Quarterly Report on Household Debt and Credit.

Rising credit card debt and auto loan balances helped to drive overall household debt levels up 1%, to $17.06 trillion for the quarter, the report showed. Overall household debt has spiked by $2.9 trillion since the end of 2019, before the pandemic. The New York Fed’s debt balances are nominal and not adjusted for inflation.

These increases are coming at a time when interest rates have quickly vaulted to a 22-year high.

Read more.

CNN’s Jake Tapper: “I feel like I’ve been noting this for three years — President Biden is out there heralding such and such, and the American people disapprove overwhelmingly! Three years in, we’re still having this conversation!” pic.twitter.com/ODTYFrN9qN

— RNC Research (@RNCResearch) August 8, 2023

Also this:

Cost to own vs rent has not been this out of whack in most people’s lifetimes.

1980 was numerically worse, but it’s still crazy how it went from a good time to buy, to a horrible time in 2 years 🚨🚨🚨

Ht Reventure Consulting YouTube pic.twitter.com/I8iwf1DDvC

— Wall Street Silver (@WallStreetSilv) August 9, 2023

AUTHOR

Pamela Geller

WOKE GOES BROKE: Anheuser-Busch Selling Off EIGHT Beer Brands as Bud Light Boycott Crushes Company

August 10, 2023

By The Geller Report

Love this. Let this be a lesson.

Former owner Billy Busch said Bud Light is no longer America’s beer and his father and grandfather “would have rolled over in their graves.”

Bud Light Parent Company Selling Off 8 Beer Brands Amid Transgender Boycott

By Tom Ozimek, August 8, 2023:

Bud Light parent company Anheuser-Busch announced it will sell eight craft beer brands to a Canadian cannabis company amid continued fallout from Bud Light’s marketing partnership with transgender influencer Dylan Mulvaney.

The deal will see Anheuser-Busch sell the following beer brands to Tilray Brands, according to an Aug. 7 announcement: Shock Top, Breckenridge Brewery, Blue Point Brewing Company, 10 Barrel Brewing Company, Redhook Brewery, Widmer Brothers Brewing, Square Mile Cider Company, and Hiball Energy.

The deal is an all-cash transaction worth $85 million, according to an 8-K filing by Tilray, which indicates the transaction is expected to close at some point in 2023.

NEW: Transgender Bud Light influencer Dylan Mulvaney has cost Anheuser-Busch $27 Billion in value.

Former owner Billy Busch says Bud Light is no longer America’s beer and his father & grandfather “would have rolled over in their graves.”

“I think people who drink beer, I think… pic.twitter.com/H4Tr8DMuyX

— Collin Rugg (@CollinRugg) August 7, 2023

The announcement comes amid continued Bud Light boycott pressures, which were sparked when Bud Light rolled out a personalized can featuring the face of Mr. Mulvaney, a male who identifies as a female.

Irwin Simon, chairman and CEO of Tilray Brands, said that the expected acquisition will elevate Tilray to the status of America’s fifth largest craft beer business and is part of the company’s efforts to further diversify into other markets than cannabis.

“Today’s announcement both solidifies our national leadership position and share in the U.S. craft brewing market and marks a major step forward in our diversification strategy,” he said in a statement.

Read more

AUTHOR

Pamela Geller

RELATED TWEET:

Anheuser-Busch is selling off eight craft beer brands as the Bud Light boycott continues to tank the company.

Tilray Brands, the largest cannabis company in the world, will be purchasing the beer brands, which include Red Hook, Shock Top, Breckenridge Brewery, Blue Point Brewing…

— Cassandra MacDonald (@CassandraRules) August 8, 2023

Inflation is NOT Gone or Reduced – Just Another Biden Regime Lie

August 5, 2023

By Royal A. Brown III

Wayne Allen Root on his great Saturday Show Americas’ Top 10 on Real America’s Voice (a livestream program) tells the TRUTH about INFLATION — see article below. The Biden regime is lying to us by saying inflation has gone/eased up. Remember this as well – food & fuel costs are way undercalculated in the govt’s CSI and Inflation statistics.

Highly recommend you watch the Real America’s Voice (RAV) channel on livestream TV featuring real conservatives shows where hosts tell the truth rather than spread Obama 3/Biden lies like the LameStream media (including Fox) do every day. All you need is your internet and a smart TV to bring up RAV or a dumb TV and a livestream device like ROKU or Firestick. Consider saving big $$$ by getting off of cable TV (which supports many leftist apps and programs at your expense) and switching to livestream and watching only what you want to at little to no cost.

By Wayne Allyn Root

You’ve heard it all. “Inflation has peaked.” “Inflation is no longer a problem.” “Disinflation is now a greater threat.” “Inflation is 0.” These are the greatest hits of government propaganda and misinformation.

But this is serious fake news. This kind of lie affects the lives of the entire American middle class. The middle class is being sacrificed. This is the murder of the middle class.

I’m not a politician, economist, or member of the mainstream media. I’m a businessman in the real world. And in the real world where I live inflation is alive and well. Inflation is still roaring and soaring.

Let me give you just a few examples…

*When I go grocery shopping, the bills are through the roof. It doesn’t matter if the cost of bread, butter, eggs, cream cheese, meat, chicken, fish, and a hundred other items has stopped rising. That’s where the fraud comes in. The media quotes economists who say, “inflation has peaked.” Let’s assume that’s true.

Let’s assume in the past three years a cart of groceries has risen from $80 to $120 to $180 to $220. Which it has. So, does it matter if so far this year it hasn’t gone up? None of us could afford it when the groceries were $120, or $180. We certainly can’t afford it when they sit at $220. Whether they’re up this year is of no consequence.

My electric bill is soaring. Last July, my electric bill was $780.13. This July my bill is $989.20. I know because just paid it today. My math says this is an increase of over 25% in one year. Isn’t green energy great! Our electric company is using more and more green energy. That’s precisely why electric bills across the country are soaring. Green energy is simply unaffordable. It will drive us all to the poor house.
My natural gas bill for my home is soaring.
My water bill is soaring.
My fuel bill for my car is up again.
My property tax bill is up.
Since everything I buy at the supermarket, and big box retailers, and at online stores, and all the other places I shop are up dramatically, and we all pay sales tax on every item we buy, my sales taxes are up dramatically.
Have you gone out to eat at a restaurant lately? I’m a businessman. I go to business lunches and dinners 10 times a week. Every one of my meals is up dramatically from three years ago. Meals that used to cost $70 to $80 three years ago, now cost $125 to $150. Sometimes at the nicer restaurants in Vegas those same meals are hitting $200. And I don’t drink.

These prices are insane. I don’t know if they’ve gone up this year. But I know A) These prices are unaffordable…and B) They are ridiculously higher than three years ago.

My storage unit cost $1,200 per year only three years ago. And they gave me a 13th month free. Then last year they jacked up the price to $1,920 for the same storage unit- and eliminated the 13th month free. This year they jacked the price up to $2,208 per year. My math says that’s an increase of over 80% in three years.
My business P.O. Box fee is up dramatically.
My legal and accounting fees are higher than ever.
My health insurance, home insurance and car insurance are all soaring.
And thanks to Obamacare, my health insurance SUCKS. It seems every bill is on me (for me and my children). The bills are overwhelming. Every minute there is a new medical expense. And very little or nothing is ever covered.

I already paid for two kids in college. Soon two more will be starting. College costs are up through the roof.

I haven’t even discussed rent, or mortgage, or car payments, or credit card bills. Because of much higher interest rates, those are all up too.

And I just got back from my first vacation in a year. Every year I rent a home in Park City, Utah for my big family to fly in from all over the country. The cost to rent a vacation home was up by 50% over last year.

So, explain to me how “inflation is gone”…or “has peaked”…or “is no longer a problem”…or “deflation is the bigger threat.”

Those are all lies, fraud, propaganda and misinformation to protect the biggest fraud, liar and spreader of misinformation in world history…President Joe Biden.

Only three things are fact…

1) Every bill that matters to the typical American family is sky high…and up dramatically from three years ago. Inflation is destroying the great American middle class. That’s “Bidenomics.”

2) All of these costs were dramatically lower under President Donald J. Trump.

3) We had the perfect “goldilocks economy” under Trump: inflation was close to zero…interest rates were among the lowest in history…unemployment was among the lowest in history…economic growth was soaring…stocks were fantastic…taxes were lower…and we had peace throughout the world.

I’m a businessman living in the real world. Those are the facts.

Here’s one more fact…

Now, more than ever, we need President Trump back in the White House.

Wayne Allyn Root is known as “the Conservative Warrior.” Watch Wayne’s TV shows- “America’s Top Ten Countdown” on Real America’s Voice TV Network on Saturdays at Noon ET…and Wayne’s daily TV show on Lindell TV 2 at 7 pm ET at FrankSpeech.com. He is also host of the nationally-syndicated “Wayne Allyn Root: Raw & Unfiltered” on USA Audio Network, daily at 6 pm ET. Wayne’s latest book is a #1 bestseller, “The Great Patriot BUY-cott Book.”

Elon Musk Describes ESG as ‘Communism Rebranded’

August 2, 2023

By The Geller Report

In an interview, Elon Musk shared sharp criticism of environmental, social, and corporate governance (ESG) principles, characterizing them as a reframe of on old communist ideas.

Elon Musk Slams Woke ESG Initiatives: It’s ‘Communism Rebranded’

By Daily Wire News • Jul 31, 2023

Elon Musk slammed environmental, social, and corporate governance (ESG) during an interview late last week, saying it was effectively a “rebranded” form of communism.

Musk made the remarks during a Friday discussion on an X Space while discussing corporations investing in implementing the woke agenda into their firms.

“We don’t basically do some sort of like bizarre, like communism rebranded thing, which is like a lot of what ESG is and to be inflicted upon corporate America without the knowledge of the actual shareholders, which is what’s going on!” Musk said.

“The big firms that you hear are BlackRock, you know, Vanguard, all them, they’re like, they’re setting themselves up for the biggest class action lawsuit in the history of class action lawsuits by an order of magnitude!” he added.

WATCH:

🚨 @ElonMusk calls the ESG scam “communism rebranded,” predicting rogue asset managers (like @BlackRock) will face the largest class action lawsuits in history over their political activism: pic.twitter.com/HITs0mZfQl

— Will Hild (@WillHild) July 31, 2023

Musk has repeatedly slammed ESG over the last few years, going as far as to call it the “devil.”

Read more.

AUTHOR

Pamela Geller

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Trucking Giant Shuts Down After 99 Years, 30,000 Could Lose Their Jobs

August 1, 2023

By The Daily Caller

Yellow, one of the largest and oldest U.S. trucking companies, shut down Sunday after succumbing to substantial debt and a lengthy standoff with the International Brotherhood of Teamsters (IBT), according to the Wall Street Journal (WSJ).

The 99-year-old company had more than 12,000 trucks moving freight across the country for Walmart, Amazon and many other small businesses that relied on their Less-Than-Truckload or LTL shipping model, the WSJ reported. Under the LTL model, customers can transport any amount of freight to allow for smaller loads. Yellow employed approximately 30,000 people, including 22,000 IBT employees. Its collapse would be the biggest in the U.S. trucking industry in terms of revenue and jobs, according to the outlet.

Yellow’s financial hardships have compounded this year as shipping demand declined and sent rates falling. Its cash holdings fell to around $100 million in June from $235 million in December, according to the WSJ.

Yellow was about $1.5 billion in debt as of March, including about $729.2 million owed to the federal government, according to Fortune. In 2020, under the Trump administration, the Treasury Department gave Yellow a $700 million pandemic-era loan as part of the COVID-19 rescue plan, citing reasons of national security, the WSJ reported.

A special congressional oversight report recently concluded that the U.S Treasury “made missteps” in their decision to give Yellow the loan, adding that Yellow’s “precarious financial position at the time of the loan, and continued struggles, expose taxpayers to a significant risk of loss.”

The company is preparing to file for bankruptcy and is discussing selling off all or parts of the business, according to the outlet.

AUTHOR

ALYSSA RINELLI

Contributor.

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