1-12-22 Records set for Inflation and Covid 😢

[lawpoke87]

Inflation now at 7%. Highest level in 40 years. Inflation has now been over 5% for 8 straight months.

We set records yesterday for new Covid cases (one week rolling average) and hospitalizations. Over 2000 new deaths. With record hospitalizations expect the death count to continue to rise. Two years in.

Still see no plan to address inflation. Printing more dollars is not a strategy btw. Appears ignoring it is the current plan. We’re suppose to have an Omicron vaccine by mid-late March. This outbreak will be over by that time at the current rate of spread. Makes no sense.

We have given almost 1 billion in aid to the Taliban over the past 4 months not counting the additional billions in military equipment we gifted them. Good to be terrorists.

Good times.

 

[astonmartin708]

Inflation now at 7%. Highest level in 40 years. Inflation has now been over 5% for 8 straight months.

We set records yesterday for new Covid cases (one week rolling average) and hospitalizations. Over 2000 new deaths. With record hospitalizations expect the death count to continue to rise. Two years in.

Still see no plan to address inflation. Printing more dollars is not a strategy btw. Appears ignoring it is the current plan. We’re suppose to have an Omicron vaccine by mid-late March. This outbreak will be over by that time at the current rate of spread. Makes no sense.

We have given almost 1 billion in aid to the Taliban over the past 4 months not counting the additional billions in military equipment we gifted them. Good to be terrorists.

Good times.

Regarding inflation: Housing, food, energy, and used cars have been the biggest drivers.

I will say that I found one thing interesting and it’s a flub on the administration’s part depending on how you view things. The Biden admin nearly doubled tariffs of Canadian Lumber imports in November of last year. That has certainly been felt in housing costs (at least of new builds). The US argument for this was that American producers have been lobbying for the tariffs because they feel the Canadian government effectively gives subsidies to their lumber mills which gives them a competitive advantage over domestic production. So the real question is… do we want to buy American wood or Canadian wood, and are we willing to pay a premium in our mortgages for it?

 

[Clong83a]

Regarding inflation: Housing, food, energy, and used cars have been the biggest drivers.

I will say that I found one thing interesting and it’s a flub on the administration’s part depending on how you view things. The Biden admin nearly doubled tariffs of Canadian Lumber imports in November of last year. That has certainly been felt in housing costs (at least of new builds). The US argument for this was that American producers have been lobbying for the tariffs because they feel the Canadian government effectively gives subsidies to their lumber mills which gives them a competitive advantage over domestic production. So the real question is… do we want to buy American wood or Canadian wood, and are we willing to pay a premium in our mortgages for it?

Food and energy stripped out still yields a 5.5% inflation rate, which is still quite high. Used cars is an issue, and plays a huge role in the current estimates. So does housing.

A car you could conceivably wait on purchasing until prices stabilize (unless your car breaks down and you need a new one).

But for the other stuff: Yeah, if you strip out all the things that people have to spend money on every month, there's not as much inflation. Hooray, I guess? Not sure this is a very good argument.

 

[Clong83a]

Inflation now at 7%. Highest level in 40 years. Inflation has now been over 5% for 8 straight months.

We set records yesterday for new Covid cases (one week rolling average) and hospitalizations. Over 2000 new deaths. With record hospitalizations expect the death count to continue to rise. Two years in.

Still see no plan to address inflation. Printing more dollars is not a strategy btw. Appears ignoring it is the current plan. We’re suppose to have an Omicron vaccine by mid-late March. This outbreak will be over by that time at the current rate of spread. Makes no sense.

We have given almost 1 billion in aid to the Taliban over the past 4 months not counting the additional billions in military equipment we gifted them. Good to be terrorists.

Good times.

Lawpoke, you've always asked about mask efficacy and any real studies that have been conducted to actually measure it. Here's a new one that recently came out that I think you'll find interesting:

https://www.pnas.org/content/118/49/e2110117118
Edit:
Here's a figure from it, showing risk of transmission for various combos of masks on infected/susceptible person. FFP2 essentially means an N95 mask in this context.

They did not investigate cloth masks, probably because there is no standard for how those are made. Presumably a random cloth mask would perform worse that surgical masks.

FWIW, I think the fact that there is no manufacturing standard on what can be marketed as an 'acceptable' cloth mask has been a failure of the CDC.

Double edit: The figure is assuming 20 minutes of face to face conversation.

 

[lawpoke87]

Regarding inflation: Housing, food, energy, and used cars have been the biggest drivers.

I will say that I found one thing interesting and it’s a flub on the administration’s part depending on how you view things. The Biden admin nearly doubled tariffs of Canadian Lumber imports in November of last year. That has certainly been felt in housing costs (at least of new builds). The US argument for this was that American producers have been lobbying for the tariffs because they feel the Canadian government effectively gives subsidies to their lumber mills which gives them a competitive advantage over domestic production. So the real question is… do we want to buy American wood or Canadian wood, and are we willing to pay a premium in our mortgages for it?

Illustrates my main point of contention. Why are we implementing inflationary policies during a time of surging inflation? I understand the argument for tariffs. However, wouldn’t it be prudent to hold off on such a policy until we get inflation under control?

 

[lawpoke87]

Lawpoke, you've always asked about mask efficacy and any real studies that have been conducted to actually measure it. Here's a new one that recently came out that I think you'll find interesting:

https://www.pnas.org/content/118/49/e2110117118
Edit:
Here's a figure from it, showing risk of transmission for various combos of masks on infected/susceptible person. FFP2 essentially means an N95 mask in this context.

They did not investigate cloth masks, probably because there is no standard for how those are made. Presumably a random cloth mask would perform worse that surgical masks.

FWIW, I think the fact that there is no manufacturing standard on what can be marketed as an 'acceptable' cloth mask has been a failure of the CDC.

Double edit: The figure is assuming 20 minutes of face to face conversation.

Thanks for posting. I’ve never questioned the effectiveness of a properly fitted N95 mask. Unfortunately, most people are wearing makeshift improperly fitted cloth masks which I’ve contended do a very poor job in reducing transmission rates in the general public. Appears the CDC is finally realizing the problem with cloth masks. While it’s a little late in the game imo I do applaud them for finally realizing there’s a problem.

 

[astonmartin708]

Illustrates my main point of contention. Why are we implementing inflationary policies during a time of surging inflation? I understand the argument for tariffs. However, wouldn’t it be prudent to hold off on such a policy until we get inflation under control?

Certainly seems like an ‘easy’ spot to ease some unnecessary inflationary pressure.

Some of this inflationary pressure like chip shortages leading to shortages and inflation in cars and consumer electronics is somewhat baked in for a while… same thing goes for energy which will likely balance its market naturally.

Other things are more alterable. No reason to impose unnecessary burdens on consumers in the short term. As far as spending goes, spending needs to occur in a targeted fashion in areas that need investment to facilitate cost savings (like public infrastructure) , but it probably needs to be combined with spending cuts in other areas as well as targeted tax increases.

 

[Clong83a]

Thanks for posting. I’ve never questioned the effectiveness of a properly fitted N95 mask. Unfortunately, most people are wearing makeshift improperly fitted cloth masks which I’ve contended do a very poor job in reducing transmission rates in the general public. Appears the CDC is finally realizing the problem with cloth masks. While it’s a little late in the game imo I do applaud them for finally realizing there’s a problem.

That is fair. I included the figure because it does show that surgical masks are almost certainly worth using. Only a 10% personal risk to myself if that guy I stopped and talked to at the grocery store for a few minutes was actually positive? I'll take it. Unmasked, it is near 100%, so it makes a huge difference.

Cloth masks are probably generally somewhere in between, but the quality and fit vary wildly, as you point out. Some are probably useless, others might actually be halfway decent. The CDC should have stepped in at least a year ago and said "here's some minimum requirements if you want to sell a cloth mask as being relevant for COVID". Simple things like the number of plys (I think they do actually say it should be two-ply), adjustibility of fit, density of thread count, etc.

 

[watu05]

Speaking of CDC and n95 masks, be careful about which ones to buy:

Counterfeit Respirators | NPPTL | NIOSH | CDC

Misrepresented respirators include all respirators that are falsely marketed and sold as NIOSH Approved respirators when they are not. Counterfeit respirators specifically refer to products trying to copy an actual NIOSH Approved model

www.cdc.gov

 

[aTUfan]

bidens solution to inflation is to raise the mw and tax the rich

 

[lawpoke87]

At least we set a record