By Rick Manning The unemployment numbers got weird in January as they jumped dramatically across the board.  The household data for January 2015 was revised, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics , to “reflect updated population estimates.” In a nutshell, the underlying assumptions the government uses in the survey of approximately 50,000 households […]

By Robert Romano The budget deficit for Fiscal Year 2014 was only $484 billion . In 2015, it will rise to $583 billion, after which it will return to below the $500 billion mark. That was one of the more ballyhooed aspects of the now-released budget from the White House Office of Management and Budget (OMB) for Fiscal Year 2015 as the Obama administration attempts to put on a facade of fiscal responsibility. There’s only […]

By Robert Romano The $3.99 trillion latest budget is available from the White House , and once again it is time to put on your rose-colored glasses. For the uninitiated, every year the President via the Office of Management and Budget is required to present his budget to Congress for consideration. Inside, one can find the administration’s views […]

By Scott Rasmussen Today, President Obama will unveil his proposed federal budget for 2016. Voters should be warned that virtually all the numbers reported in news coverage of the federal budget will be misleading at best. That’s because the budget reporting will be written primarily […]

By Robert Romano Deflation? No, not footballs. In this case, a growing number of economic observers are becoming concerned about falling prices, in the Eurozone, the Pacific, and elsewhere — and what it means for the global economy. In the 1930s, falling prices were a scourge. Assets […]

By Robert Romano With the radical left party Syriza taking power in Greece — winning 36 percent of the vote and 149 out of 300 seats in the Greek parliament — speculation has begun anew on whether Greece will leave the Eurozone as the sovereign debt crisis there roils on. Call them Occupy Athens. But, as it turns out, the victory was not […]

By Robert Romano “Slow rise in consumer prices may stymie the Fed.” So reports the New York Times’ Binyamin Appelbaum on January 16 , responding to a recent report from the Bureau of Labor Statistics showing another drop in consumer prices for the second month in a row. Prices dropped 0.4 percent in December, led primarily by a 9.4 percent drop in gasoline and a 7.8 percent […]

By Don Todd Walmart is the nation’s largest private employer.  It is a non-union business.  It may surprise many than the United Food and Commercial Workers (UFCW) union has no interest in organizing Walmart employees. Who says so?  They do. This, despite the fact that UFCW has […]

By Don Todd Both the United Food and Commercial Workers ( UFCW ) and the Service Employees International Union (SEIU) are strong proponents of raising the minimum wage.  For instance on July 18, 2012, Mary Kay Henry the President of SEIU emailed her members the following: “Together with organizations like the National […]