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Michael Linden@michaelslinden.bsky.social |
334 followers 86 following 65 posts
Budget and Econ policy wonk. Senior Policy Fellow at Washington Center for Equitable Growth. Formerly: OMB, Senate Budget, Senate HELP, Groundwork, CAP.
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Michael Linden
@michaelslinden.bsky.social
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I'm glad to see some of the "vibes" catching up to the economic data. It's important because the economic progress we've made is the result of real policy choices. If we want to build on current progress, good policy needs to get credit.
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Aaron Rupar
@atrupar.bsky.social
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Biden isn't in an ideal position heading into 2024. But on the economy, he's in great shape, and really doesn't get the credit he deserves when one considers the shambles he inherited in January 2021.
34 replies 47 reposts 345 likes
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Aaron Sojourner
@aaronsojourner.org
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"These estimates suggest that Food Stamps’ transfer of resources to families is a highly cost-effective investment in young children, yielding a marginal value of public funds of approximately [$62 in benefits per $1 in public funds spent]."
www.restud.com/is-the-socia...
2 replies 11 reposts 29 likes
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Michael Linden
@michaelslinden.bsky.social
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Michael Linden
@michaelslinden.bsky.social
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Here's the chart for overall unemployment rate by race.
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Michael Linden
@michaelslinden.bsky.social
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Absolutely true! Currently, the overall unemployment rate for Black Americans is 2.5 points higher than it is for White Americans. That gap is smaller than it was pre-pandemic and a lot smaller than a decade ago. But we still have to--and can--do better!
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Michael Linden
@michaelslinden.bsky.social
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Totally fair. This is the number of Black workers who were unemployed for 27 weeks or longer, going back to before the Great Recession.
0 replies 6 reposts 23 likes
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Michael Linden
@michaelslinden.bsky.social
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Now that inflation is back down to pre-pandemic levels, we have a chance to pay some paying attention to economic stories that have been obscured. e.g. Last recession, millions were stuck for years in crushing, long-term unemployment. But not this time! Hard to overstate how important this is.
5 replies 21 reposts 60 likes
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Jason O. Gilbert
@gilbertjasono.bsky.social
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Is Joe Biden’s Economy So Good It’s Actually Bad?
50 replies 159 reposts 888 likes
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Bobby Kogan
@bbkogan.bsky.social
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I’m not sure if it’s been posted on this site yet, but Treasury is out with G7 real wage growth analysis. The US is leading the pack. And not only are we leading, we’re the *only* G7 country with meaningful growth. All other G7 countries have seen stagnation or decline in real wages.
0 replies 3 reposts 11 likes
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Michael Linden
@michaelslinden.bsky.social
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My father, a political science professor for 40 years, used to joke that his undergrads would write, "The earth cooled. And there was Poland."
3 replies 12 reposts 127 likes
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Michael Linden
@michaelslinden.bsky.social
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The ten most dangerous and frightening words in the English language: "Trust me, I know what I'm doing. I'm a billionaire."
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Michael Linden
@michaelslinden.bsky.social
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And 2. Inflation is really salient (even when wages rise even faster than prices) and because corporations will use the opportunity of economic dislocation to juice their profits if they can, including by raising prices, public policy needs to take that more seriously.
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Michael Linden
@michaelslinden.bsky.social
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What I hope people will take away from this episode is two things: 1. The government can and should deploy public resources to get us as close to full employment as possible as quickly as possible. The benefits to well-being for everyday people are enormous, especially compared to the alternative.
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Michael Linden
@michaelslinden.bsky.social
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I think Binyamin is asking something important here, and I also agree that a lot of political actors will ask it this way. But it's also not quite the right question, since the temporary, but painful, inflation we experienced was not really a byproduct of our economic policy.
1 replies 1 reposts 4 likes
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Michael Linden
@michaelslinden.bsky.social
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I know that there is so much more progress to be made, but it's worth taking a moment to celebrate that inflation has come way down, wages are rising (and rising fastest for people with the lowest wages) and the strong labor market continues to deliver real gains to those who need them the most.
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George Pearkes
@peark.es
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The huge nominal expansion in economic activity from the post-COVID recovery was an unmitigated policy success. Wage growth kept up with inflation, labor bargaining power rose, debt burdens were inflated down. People arguing against it are arguing for a capital-friendly, labor-hostile regime.
14 replies 86 reposts 224 likes
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Michael Linden
@michaelslinden.bsky.social
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This is excellent. Take 15 minutes and watch.
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Paul Krugman
@pkrugman.bsky.social
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The Fed's preferred measure of underlying inflation, measured over 6 mos at an annual rate, has declined from 4.5 to 2.5 over the past 6 months. So, if underlying inflation can fall almost in half without a major rise in unemployment, in what sense was it "underlying"?
7 replies 25 reposts 136 likes
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Michael Linden
@michaelslinden.bsky.social
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It took 8.5 years after the end of the Great Recession for the unemployment rate to fall below 4%. After the COVID recession? Less than 2 years.
3 replies 41 reposts 110 likes
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Michael Linden
@michaelslinden.bsky.social
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And underneath it all, the House GOP's purpoorted fiscal rationale doesn't make any sense. To the degree we should be concerned about increased fiscal risks, the driver of that increased risk is tax cuts, not discretionary spending (which is still below the historical average).
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Michael Linden
@michaelslinden.bsky.social
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Second, their cuts are economically counterproductive. House GOP wants to cut K-12 education, cancer research, and infrastructure funding. These investments all pay huge economic dividends. They also want to cut things that directly reduce household costs (e.g. energy and food).
1 replies 0 reposts 1 likes
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Michael Linden
@michaelslinden.bsky.social
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My piece in the Hill laying out some important things to understand about the House GOP's extreme demands for deep cuts. First of all, Dems already made funding concessions as part of the debt limit deal. We did that in the service of a normal approps process. It was House GOP who blew that up.
1 replies 5 reposts 7 likes
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Roosevelt Institute
@rooseveltinstitute.bsky.social
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"Raising interest rates did not address the problem we faced: supply-side and demand-shift inflation. If anything, disinflation has happened despite central banks’ actions, not because of them."
Our Chief Economist Joseph Stiglitz shares lessons on inflation: rooseveltinstitute.org/2023/11/15/a...
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Michael Linden
@michaelslinden.bsky.social
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I'm not on tiktok, but this would infuriate me too! The only threat to Social Security is a political one. And it helps those who want to cut Social Security if young people believe it won't be there for them.
2 replies 18 reposts 59 likes
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Brendan Nyhan
@brendannyhan.bsky.social
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"while respondents of both parties exhibit partisan bias, the magnitude of their bias is not the same" www.briefingbook.info/p/asymmetric...
1 replies 9 reposts 20 likes
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Brian Beutler
@brianbeutler.bsky.social
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www.offmessage.net/p/media-repu...
1 replies 4 reposts 14 likes
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Michael Linden
@michaelslinden.bsky.social
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Real wages (i.e. wages adjusted for inflation) for non-supervisory workers grew by an annualized rate of about 2.4% last month. And yes, real wages are higher now than they were pre-pandemic.
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Michael Linden
@michaelslinden.bsky.social
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I think rate cuts have to be on the table.
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Michael Linden
@michaelslinden.bsky.social
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House Rs just pulled their Financial Services bill because they don't have the votes (just like transpo/housing). The bill includes: - Cuts to consumer product safety - Cuts to small business aid - Cuts to financial crimes enforcement And of course: cuts to tax enforcement for rich people.
1 replies 5 reposts 14 likes
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Michael Linden
@michaelslinden.bsky.social
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I know it shouldn't surprise me, but I'm still a little bit gobsmacked that we're having a debate where one side's view is "Very rich people should pay the taxes they already, legally, owe." And the other side's position, "No, they should be allowed to cheat on their taxes."
1 replies 3 reposts 6 likes
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Michael Linden
@michaelslinden.bsky.social
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The Senate Budget Committee is currently holding a hearing on the impacts of IRS enforcement funding. One of the witnesses is Dr. Nathaniel Hendren who co-authored a recent study which found that each new enforcement dollar spent focused on high-income individuals generates $12 back.
1 replies 1 reposts 6 likes
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Michael Linden
@michaelslinden.bsky.social
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Understandably lost in the shuffle of last night is the news that the House GOP pulled their own Transpo/Housing bill from the floor due to lack of support. Maybe that's because it includes huge cuts to lead remediation, affordable housing, trains, and transit.
9 replies 63 reposts 314 likes
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Adam Serwer
@adamserwer.bsky.social
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I think some political reporters should try a little harder to hide their disappointment at Dems over performing relative to Biden’s approval ratings but that’s just me
35 replies 281 reposts 1753 likes
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Groundwork Collaborative
@groundwork.bsky.social
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Unemployment is low. Wages are rising. Our economy continues to grow. Ahead of tomorrow's jobs report, Groundwork's Kitty Richards reminds us that we didn't get here by accident: "We must continue to invest in [programs] that make our economy & communities stronger."
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Michael Linden
@michaelslinden.bsky.social
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There's this idea in economics of "revealed preferences": what consumers actually buy is a better indication of true preferences than what they may *say* they want. House Republicans have yet again revealed their strong preference for low taxes on rich people over reducing deficits.
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Bryce Covert
@brycecovert.bsky.social
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I am begging everyone not to take Republicans seriously when they say they have to cut a bunch of important programs because they're so worried about the deficit.
0 replies 6 reposts 12 likes
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Michael Linden
@michaelslinden.bsky.social
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One of the ills that has been plaguing the American economy for some time is a damaging imbalance of power, with far too much of it concentrated in too few hands. That's bad for everyone. More worker power helps all workers, and it helps rebalance the economy for everyone.
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Roosevelt Institute
@rooseveltinstitute.bsky.social
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"We might discover that the trade-off between economic strength and social welfare was never really a trade-off at all."
Open Markets Institute's Brian Callaci explains the rise & fall of neoliberal policymaking & the path it's created for the emerging paradigm: www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archiv...
1 replies 2 reposts 7 likes
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Michael Linden
@michaelslinden.bsky.social
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Three things can be true all the at the same time: The economy is delivering much-needed gains to millions of hard-working families Good news recently doesn't make up for long stretches of bad news. Your personal experience can differ from the overall experience.
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Michael Linden
@michaelslinden.bsky.social
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How do you feel about medians?
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Michael Linden
@michaelslinden.bsky.social
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I do love a good spreadsheet. But I also love it when low-income households see the biggest increase in household wealth on record. I also love it when low-income workers see their wages grow. I also love it when there are more good paying jobs, and inequality falls.
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Michael Linden
@michaelslinden.bsky.social
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I agree with that! We have a lot of ground to make up after roughly 40 years of stagnant wage growth (and skyrocketing inequality). Journey of a thousand miles...
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Michael Linden
@michaelslinden.bsky.social
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No one is saying that. This is a big country with lots of varied experiences, and the economy has failed working people for a very long time. No one is saying all is fixed. And it's also true that, right now, wages are growing, jobs are growing, household wealth is growing.
3 replies 0 reposts 1 likes
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Michael Linden
@michaelslinden.bsky.social
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"Real wages" just means wages, adjusted for inflation. So, in other words, wages are currently growing faster than inflation. I know that's not going to be true for every single person, but it is true overall and we know it's true for lower-income people especially.
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Michael Linden
@michaelslinden.bsky.social
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Real wages are growing. Job creation remains robust. Household wealth is up (including for the middle and the bottom). Overall economic growth is up. Inflation is down. Those are facts.
47 replies 8 reposts 39 likes
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Skanda Amarnath
@skandaamarnath.bsky.social
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Trends in job growth and wage growth keep defying aggressive Phillips Curve predictions, recession calls, and claims of entrenched inflation Job growth has been solid even while slowing. Wage growth slowing w/o real unemployment increase or total correction in job openings
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Michael Linden
@michaelslinden.bsky.social
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Posting this recent study showing that the return to auditing high-income individuals is more than 12 to 1.
That is to say: for every dollar spent auditing rich people, the federal government gets back more than $12 dollars.
www.nber.org/papers/w31376
0 replies 4 reposts 6 likes
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George Pearkes
@peark.es
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The left wing subset of this is instructive I think. We've had a series of mini jubilees + high inflation that wacked down debt loads. Low end of the labor market is crushing it. Unions ascendent. But tons of left-wing posters spend all day doomering about tHe EcOnOmY for attention. It's wild!
11 replies 24 reposts 109 likes
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Michael Linden
@michaelslinden.bsky.social
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It's simply not true that we "can't afford" these programs. We are an extremely wealthy society, with extremely low taxes by global standards. We could certainly finance Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid, even with an aging population, if we had a better tax code.
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