Tag Archive for: inflation

‘Inflation Tax’ Is Higher Than Federal Income Tax

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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.”

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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Inflation Refuses To Go Away As Prices Stay High

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Inflation refused to significantly ease despite the Federal Reserve’s efforts to rein in high prices, according to the latest Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) inflation report released on Wednesday.

The Consumer Price Index (CPI), a broad measure of the prices of everyday goods such as energy and food, increased 4.9% on an annual basis in April compared to 5% in March, according to the BLS. Core CPI — which excludes energy and food — remained high, rising 5.5% year-over-year in April, compared to 5.6% in March.

The increase was driven primarily by a rise in shelter costs, which jumped 0.4% in April compared to 0.6% in March, according to the BLS. Inflation grew 0.4% on a monthly basis in April, compared to 0.1% in March, according to the BLS.

The index for used cars and trucks increased 4.4% and the index for motor vehicle insurance rose 1.4%, according to the BLS. The indices for recreation, household furnishings and operations and personal care also increased.

The energy index decreased 5.1% over the 12 months ending in April while the food index increased 7.7% for the last year.

Inflation reached 9.1% in June 2022, its highest point since 1982, according to the BLS.

“The direction of inflation is getting less bad, but pace of improvement is still frustratingly slow,” Bill Adams, chief economist for Comerica Bank told Morningstar.

“Inflation has stayed higher for longer than the conventional forecasting techniques would lead us to believe, and so the risk is that the persistence of inflation continues,” he said. “That’s another way of saying that once inflation has picked up, it’s hard to slow down again. And that’s where we are now.”

The CPI report follows an unexpectedly hot jobs report on Friday as the U.S. added 253,000 jobs in April, and the unemployment rate dropped slightly to 3.4%, according to BLS data.

“We remain committed to bringing inflation back down to our 2% goal and to keep our longer-term inflation expectations well-anchored,” Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell, who has raised interest rates ten consecutive times in an attempt to lower inflation, said Wednesday in a press conference following the Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) meeting. “Reducing inflation is likely to require a period of below-trend growth and some softening of labor market conditions.”

AUTHOR

JASON COHEN

Contributor.

RELATED ARTICLE: Core Inflation Still Sky High, New Report Shows

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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.

Prices Stay Sky-High In October As Inflation Continues To Run Hot

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Inflation rose 0.4% on a monthly basis in October as the annual rate undercut expectations to come in at 7.7%, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS).

Economists predicted that inflation would grow 0.6% on a monthly basis and 7.9% on an annual basis in October, according to a survey conducted by Bloomberg. Core inflation, which discounts the prices of food and energy due to their volatile nature, increased 0.3% on a monthly basis, but nudged down in October to 6.3% on an annual basis from September’s 40-year high of 6.6%, the BLS reported.

“A strong labor market and strong job growth supports strong demand, which allows inflationary pressures to stay elevated,” U.S. economist at T. Rowe Price, Blerina Uruci, told The Wall Street Journal. “You’ve got more demand chasing goods and services, the supply of which is being impaired at the moment for a number of reasons.”

Food prices were up 10.9% on an annual basis, continuing to moderate slightly from the 40-year highs set in August but still well above February’s 8.6%, which was a record at the time, and more than five times greater than the Federal Reserve’s target of 2% inflation for all items.

Investors took recent remarks from Jerome Powell as an indication that the Fed will likely stop raising interest rates at a higher level than previously anticipated, Yahoo Finance reported Sunday.

AUTHOR

JOHN HUGH DEMASTRI

Contributor.

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Unemployment Surges Above Expectations As The Number Of Jobless Americans Rises

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The unemployment rate rose to 3.7% in October, up from expectations it would hold steady at 3.5%, as the number of jobless Americans rose to 6.1 million, the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) reported Friday.

Labor force participation nudged down 0.1% from September to October, to 62.2%, according to the BLS. Despite employers adding 261,000 jobs overall in October, down from 315,000 in September, the number of unemployed people rose by 306,000, up to 6.1 million, the highest level since February, according to the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis.

The unemployment range has hovered between 3.5% to 3.7% since March, and labor force participation has hovered 1.2 percentage points below the pre-pandemic standard set in February 2020, the BLS reported. Monthly job growth has been slowing, with employers adding 372,000 jobs per month in the third quarter of 2022, down from 543,000 in the third quarter of 2021, according to The Wall Street Journal.

The number of additions blew past investors’ expectations of a more-modest gain of 205,000 jobs, and the unemployment rate surpassed predictions it would hold steady at 3.5%, the WSJ reported. The labor market is anticipated to slow as the Federal Reserve continues to hike interest rates in its bid to combat inflation.

“The broader picture is of an overheated labor market where demand substantially exceeds supply,” Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell said in a Wednesday press conference, according to the WSJ. “I don’t see the case for real softening just yet.”

The BLS data contradicts a Wednesday report from payroll firm ADP, which had estimated that the manufacturing sector had cut 20,000 jobs in October. In contrast, the BLS data finds that manufacturers added 32,000 jobs in October, slower than the 37,000 per month average in 2022, but faster than the 30,000 per month seen in 2021.

AUTHOR

JOHN HUGH DEMASTRI

Contributor.

RELATED ARTICLE: The Federal Reserve Hikes Interest Rates Again As Inflation Rages On

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The Federal Reserve Hikes Interest Rates Again As Inflation Rages On

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The Federal Reserve announced an interest rate hike of 0.75 percentage points, bumping the range of the federal interest rate to between 3.75% and 4% following a Wednesday meeting of Fed policymakers.

The rate hike matches investor expectations and is the fifth consecutive hike since March and the fourth at this aggressive pace since June as the Federal Reserve attempts to cool the economy and blunt persistently high inflation, The Wall Street Journal reported Tuesday. All eyes are now on the Fed’s December meeting, with investors debating whether the Fed will continue at its aggressive pace of 0.75 percentage point hikes or slow to 0.5 in a bid to ease the pressure on an economy an emerging consensus of analysts say is heading towards a recession.

Some investors were hoping the Fed would begin a “pivot” towards reduced rate hikes in December after various signs that the economy was beginning to slow, Reuters reported Tuesday. However, following a Bureau of Labor Statistics report Tuesday that showed an unexpectedly strong labor market, with job openings in September nearly recouping an August decline, some investors believe the Fed will likely see itself as having more work to do in prompting a slowdown.

“Despite other signs of economic deceleration,” Ronald Temple, head of U.S. equity at financial advisory firm Lazard Asset Management, told Reuters, “the job openings data taken together with nonfarm payroll growth indicate the Fed is far from the point where it can declare victory over inflation and lift its foot off the economic brake.”

So-called “core inflation,” which measures inflation less food and energy, ticked up to 5.1% year-on-year in September, according to the Fed’s preferred inflation metric, the Personal Consumption Expenditures (PCE) price index. The more well-known Consumer Price Index (CPI) has repeatedly come in hot, with its most recent reading also showing soaring core inflation, up 0.6% on a monthly basis in September and up 6.6% on an annual basis.

Heightened rates have pushed people away from buying houses at the fastest rates on record, as 30-year fixed mortgage rates hit their highest levels in 20 years. Elevated interest rates are also putting pressure on the federal government, with the cost of interest on the $31.1 trillion national debt set to surpass the $750 billion spent on defense this fiscal year by 2026, according to CNN.

AUTHOR

JOHN HUGH DEMASTRI

Contributor.

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An Inflation Nation — The New Norm

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Hard working Americans continue to suffer from historically high levels of inflation caused by the Biden administration’s out-of-control spending and opposition to domestic energy production. Soon after the Bureau of Labor Statistics released the Consumer Price Index (CPI) report for September, which confirmed inflation is accelerating and isn’t going away anytime soon, President Joe Biden claimed “If Republicans win, inflation’s going to get worse.”

Such a reckless claim demonstrates the president’s fundamental misunderstanding of the problem his policies have caused … or how to solve it. 

Overall inflation was up another 0.4% in September, or 8.2% year-over-year. Even the less volatile measure of “core” inflation increased by 0.6% in September for a 12-month increase of 6.6%. This is the highest increase in core inflation in 40 years and shows that inflation is broad-based and continues to spread throughout the economy.

Americans are well-aware that food prices have increased dramatically. Food prices rose 0.8% in September alone and have increased 11.2% in the last 12 months. This is the highest year-over-year increase in the United States since 1979. Cereals and bakery items are up 16.2%, dairy items are up 15.9% and fruits and vegetables are up 10.4%.

American workers also suffered another month of declining purchasing power last month. These decreases have become all too customary under the Biden administration’s policies, and in just the past year, purchasing power fell by 3.3%. Since the beginning of the Biden administration, the average worker has paid a $2,500 inflation tax. Lower-income Americans and senior citizens on fixed incomes are particularly vulnerable to rapid price increases.

Ongoing inflation has led the Federal Reserve to engage in some of the most aggressive monetary policy most Americans have ever seen. That’s bad news for Americans whose investments are being destroyed and whose dreams of owning a home or starting a business are being delayed. The Wall Street Journal reports that 30-year fixed-rate mortgages now average more than 7.1% compared to just 3% a year ago.

For a homebuyer borrowing $250,000, the monthly interest and principal payment has increased from approximately $1,050 per month to a staggering $1,680 per month.

The only thing keeping the headline inflation rate from hitting another 40-year high is that energy prices declined slightly in September. That appears to be changing quickly, and not in a good way.

The energy prices in September’s inflation report were recorded before the OPEC+ announcement that the cartel will cut production by two million barrels per day starting in November. A market correction also looms around the corner when the administration’s releases of oil from the strategic petroleum reserve will come to an end. Because it refuses to expand domestic production, the Biden administration will be left with few real options to lower prices at the pump.

The announced reduction of 2 million barrels per day, combined with the long overdue termination of releases from the strategic reserve is already assessed to send oil prices skyrocketing. Goldman Sachs recently forecasted that oil prices will likely reach $110 per barrel.

The 4.9% decline in gasoline prices in September is but a temporary reprieve, and it is highly probable that a national average of $5.00 per gallon will once again crush Americans’ wallets.

Oil and gasoline are only one piece of a more eerie picture. The coming winter should be of significant concern. Natural gas prices are driven by global factors, and with the ongoing Russian invasion of Ukraine, Europe is facing a potential economic catastrophe driven by extreme energy volatility. This would further raise prices for heating American households.

The Biden administration’s embrace of big government socialism has wrought the worst economy in 40 years. Rather than trusting the American people’s ingenuity, the administration’s centralization of authority and special interest cronyism have devastated our Nation’s citizens. Government debt is now more than $31 trillion, and forecasters estimate deficits of more than $1 trillion per year in the future.

Dependency, debt, and demagoguery are not the foundation of a strong economy. Only by returning to an America First economic approach led by renewed energy independence can the American people once again realize the shared prosperity we enjoyed a few short years ago.

The views and opinions expressed in this commentary are those of the author and do not reflect the official position of the Daily Caller News Foundation.

AUTHORS

SAM BUCHAN

Sam Buchan is a former Director for International Economic Policy on the National Economic Council and is currently the Director of the Center for Energy and Environment at the America First Policy Institute.

MICHAEL FAULKENDER

Michael Faulkender is a former Assistant Secretary for Economic Policy at the Department of the Treasury and is currently a Senior Fellow at the America First Policy Institute.

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EDITORS NOTE: This Daily Caller column is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved. Content created by The Daily Caller News Foundation is available without charge to any eligible news publisher that can provide a large audience. For licensing opportunities of our original content, please contact licensing@dailycallernewsfoundation.org.

Inflation Stays Sky-High As Core Prices Soar Above Expectations

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UPDATE: Biden “Our economy is strong as hell.”

Inflation increased 0.4% in September from August as “core” inflation, measuring the price of goods excluding food and energy, soared above expectations to a 40-year-high, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS).

Core inflation rose 6.6% year-over-year and 0.6% month-to-month in September, beating year-over-year expectations by 0.1%, while the Consumer Price Index (CPI) fell 8.2% overall year-over-year despite spiking 0.4% from August, the BLS announced Thursday. Economists had predicted CPI would fall 8.1% year-on-year in September, down from 8.3% in August.

The decline in overall inflation can be attributed largely to a decline in energy costs, although they remain elevated by 19.8% year-on-year compared to 23.8% in August, according to the BLS. Food costs remain historically high, with the overall food index falling slightly to 11.2% annually, down from 11.4% in August.

With both headline and core inflation still well above the Federal Reserve’s target of 2%, the Federal Reserve is unlikely to halt its aggressive campaign of interest rate hikes, CNBC reported Wednesday. Goldman Sachs warned investors late September that even in the event of a so-called “soft landing,” where the Federal Reserve tames inflation without inducing a recession or a significant increase in unemployment, the Fed is likely to continue aggressive rate hikes through the end of the year, raising rates from the current baseline of 3.25% up to 4.5%.

The U.S. added 263,000 jobs in September, the slowest rate of the year, as the labor market continued to cool. Bank of America’s chief U.S. economist Michael Gapen warned Monday that unemployment could spike if the Fed continues its rate hikes, pushing unemployment as high as 5.5% from its current level at 3.5%, costing the U.S. 175,000 jobs per month early next year.

“No doubt the Fed still has its work cut out for them, and if tomorrow’s CPI read is hot, don’t be surprised to see some investors come to grips with how long the road to tamer inflation may be,” Mike Loewengart, head of portfolio management at Morgan Stanley told CNBC.

AUTHOR

JOHN HUGH DEMASTRI

Contributor.

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EDITORS NOTE: This Daily Caller column is republished with permission. All rights reserved. Content created by The Daily Caller News Foundation is available without charge to any eligible news publisher that can provide a large audience. For licensing opportunities of our original content, please contact licensing@dailycallernewsfoundation.org.

U.S. Adds Fewest Jobs This Year As Labor Market Cools

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The U.S. labor market cooled once again in September, adding the fewest jobs this calendar year, according to a Friday morning report from the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), fueling investor hopes that the Federal Reserve might reduce the intensity of its anti-inflation campaign.

The U.S. added 263,000 jobs in August, slightly higher than investor expectations, a meaningful drop from August’s addition of 315,000, and half the 528,000 added in July, according to the BLS. The unemployment rate edged down to 3.5% in September, from 3.7% in August, with 5.8 million Americans currently unemployed, beating investor expectations.

The decline in job growth is another sign that the red-hot labor market is beginning to cool after job openings plunged 10% to 10 million in September from 11.1 million in August, according to a Tuesday BLS report. This slowdown is likely to be welcomed by investors, who hope that loosening labor conditions might prompt the Federal Reserve to reduce the intensity of its anti-inflation campaign, according to CNBC.

Members of the Federal Open Market Committee, the Fed group that sets its policy on interest rates, have been consistent in their messaging that high interest rates and elevated levels of inflation are expected to last at least another several months. The battle against inflation is still “in the early days,” said President Raphael Bostic of the Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta, according to CNBC.

Wages grew by 5% over the past 12 months in September without accounting for inflation, according to the BLS. In August, wages were up 5.2% over the previous 12 months, without accounting for inflation, but once inflation and a reduction in the average hours worked were considered, earnings actually decreased by 2.8% in August, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

“Despite the stronger wage growth due to the tightness of the labor market, a majority of workers are finding their wages falling even further behind inflation,” Fed researchers wrote in a Tuesday report on wage growth published by the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas on Tuesday.

A small minority of workers saw significant real wage growth, while the proportion of workers who saw wages decline fell slightly from pandemic-era highs to 53.4%, the highest rate since 2011, the Fed researchers reported. Amongst those that saw wages decline, the median decline was 8.6%, far greater than the typical range of a 5.7% to 6.8% decline seen in the past 25 years.

Earnings data for September is due on Sept. 13, alongside inflation data in the Consumer Price Index (CPI), a measure of the inflation faced by typical urban households in the U.S.

AUTHOR

JOHN HUGH DEMASTRI

Contributor.

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The Stock Market Officially Collapses Into Bear Market Territory

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The stock market closed out a week of intense losses with the Dow Jones falling more than 750 points Friday, entering bear market territory amid a wave of investor fears.

At time of writing, the index had, at its lowest point, fallen more than 2.7% during the day to around 29,300 points, with the Nasdaq and S&P 500 down by 2.7% and 2.64% respectively at time of writing. With the Dow Jones officially falling more than 20% from its recent peak in June, stocks will have entered a slump known by investors as a “bear market” if the losses hold when trading ends Friday, according to CNBC.

The Nasdaq was down by 30.92% this year, with the S&P 500 down 22.98% this year, as of close of business yesterday, according to data from MarketWatch.

“Stocks were overvalued because their nominal price has been fueled by the inflation of the Federal Reserve,” Heritage Foundation economist E.J. Antoni told the Daily Caller News Foundation. “As soon as the Fed took away the punch bowl… what happened? Stocks immediately took a nosedive and are continuing to do so, because the only thing that has been fueling this economic recovery hasn’t been real growth, but again, money creation.”

After wavering early this week as investors awaited the Federal Reserve’s Wednesday announcement of a third interest rate hike in just four months, stocks tumbled, with Goldman Sachs warning clients that investors are preparing for recession and slashing its expectations for the S&P 500 stock index by 16%.

After wavering early this week as investors awaited the Federal Reserve’s Wednesday announcement of a third interest rate hike in just four months, stocks tumbled, with Goldman Sachs warning clients that investors are preparing for recession and slashing its expectations for the S&P 500 stock index by 16%.

“Now we’re faced with the reality of having to do it the hard way, of having to actually grow the economy and not just grow the money supply.” Antoni said.

AUTHOR

JOHN HUGH DEMASTRI

Contributor.

RELATED ARTICLE: Stocks Stay Volatile As Recession Fears Loom

EDITORS NOTE: This Daily Caller column is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved. Content created by The Daily Caller News Foundation is available without charge to any eligible news publisher that can provide a large audience. For licensing opportunities of our original content, please contact licensing@dailycallernewsfoundation.org.

Fearing Fed, Stocks Tumble And Major Investor Slashes Expectations

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All three major U.S. stock indices fell Friday morning as investors worried that the Federal Reserve’s ongoing campaign of aggressive interest rate hikes would weaken the economy.

With Friday poised to be the fourth day in a row of slumping stocks, the Dow Jones Industrial average fell by 1.36%, the S&P 500 by 1.7% and the Nasdaq Composite fell by 2%, according to CNBC. Investors’ fears followed a late Thursday announcement by Goldman Sachs analysts, who slashed their year-end expectations for the S&P 500 by 16%, according to Reuters.

“Based on our client discussions, a majority of equity investors have adopted the view that a hard landing scenario is inevitable and their focus is on the timing, magnitude and duration of a potential recession and investment strategies for that outlook,” David Kostin, an analyst at Goldman, wrote in the note, according to Reuters.

This follows a Goldman Sachs note released earlier this week, which warned that the Fed was unlikely to relent from its pace of interest rate hikes, even in the event of a so-called “soft landing” where inflation is managed without inducing a recession. Fed Chair Jerome Powell has been clear that the agency will continue rate hikes until inflation is brought under control, and is well on its way to the Fed’s target of 2% annually.

Goldman’s earlier note predicted that the Fed would continue raising rates at least through the end of the year, with a 0.75% interest rate hike in November and a 0.5% interest rate hike in December. Central banks around the world, even some that previously had negative interest rates, have been aggressively pursuing rate hikes as inflation hammers economies worldwide, according to The Wall Street Journal.

AUTHOR

JOHN HUGH DEMASTRI

Contributor.

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Key Inflation Indicator Remains Sky-High In Another Worrying Sign For Businesses

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The prices faced by producers rose by 8.7% year-on-year in August as inflation continues to challenge businesses, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS).

While down from the near-record highs of 11.3% in June, the current price increases were over 4 times the typical rates — between 1 and 3% annually — seen in 2019 and 2020, according to data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics’ Producer Price Index (PPI), which measures the prices suppliers charge businesses and other customers. These elevated rates mirror Tuesday’s Consumer Price Index (CPI), which pegged inflation at 8.3%, according to the BLS.

A significant component of the decrease was accounted for by a 5.2% decline in energy costs, according to the BLS. Mirroring July’s results, the index for foods and all goods less food and energy rose by 0.1% and 0.2%, respectively.

The index for all products other than foods, energy and trade services rose by 5.6% year-over-year,  less than the 5.8% posted in July, according to the BLS. The price for unprocessed goods was still incredibly elevated, at 36.1%, more than July’s value of 30.4%, as a spike in the price of natural gas kept prices up.

The Biden administration has been taking a victory lap on economic conditions, with Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen claiming the economy had undergone one of the fastest recoveries in modern history. President Joe Biden claimed that the passage of the Inflation Reduction Act had helped to combat inflation “at the kitchen table,” in a Tuesday speech at the White House.

Simultaneously, the BLS’ monthly CPI report placed inflation at 8.3%, and found that food prices had increased 13.5% annually. Rent and electricity were also up, 6.7% and 15.8% respectively.

Increased rent prices have put pressure on families in particular, with the average cost of a single family rental home up about 13.4% this year, according to CNBC. At a median cost of $2,495 per month, families who might otherwise save to purchase a house are being priced out of home ownership, CNBC reported.

Gas prices also remained incredibly elevated, despite having fallen 12.2% month-on-month, and were still up 25.6% compared to the same time last year, the BLS reported.

AUTHOR

JOHN HUGH DEMASTRI

Contributor.

RELATED ARTICLE: Food Prices Hit 40-Year High, Keep Breaking Records Every Month

EDITORS NOTE: This Daily Caller column is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved. Content created by The Daily Caller News Foundation is available without charge to any eligible news publisher that can provide a large audience. For licensing opportunities of our original content, please contact licensing@dailycallernewsfoundation.org.

‘Unconscionable’: Biden Admin Renames Hundreds Of ‘Racist And Derogatory’ Landmarks

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The first recorded version of squa was found in a book called Mourt’s Relation: A Journey of the Pilgrims at Plymouth written in 1622. The term was not used in a derogatory fashion but spoke of the “squa sachim or Massachusetts Queen” in the September 20, 1621 journal entry.

“Squaw comes from a language of the Algonquian family in which it meant ‘woman’.” — The True History of the Word Squaw

President Joe Biden’s Interior Department (DOI) released replacement names for almost 650 “racist and derogatory” geographical features on federal lands, the agency said Thursday.

The word “squaw” was determined by DOI’s Board of Geographic Names to be an an “offensive ethnic, racial and sexist slur, particularly for Indigenous women,” according to a press release. The word is from 1622 and means “an Indigenous woman of North America,” according to Merriam-Webster, and it was in the names of canyons, lakes, springs and other geographical features until Thursday.

“I feel a deep obligation to use my platform to ensure that our public lands and waters are accessible and welcoming,” DOI Secretary Deb Haaland said Thursday. “Together, we are showing why representation matters and charting a path for an inclusive America.”

DOI created a Derogatory Geographic Names Task Force in 2021, saying in an order “squaw” will soon be moved out of the names in federal land features. The agency held a final vote on the land name replacements and the Derogatory Geographic Names Task Force received over 1,000 name recommendations during the public comment period, DOI said Thursday.

Karen Budd-Falen, deputy solicitor for DOI’s parks and wildlife division under former President Donald Trump, said the Biden administration is too focused on “political correctness” instead of more important policy issues.

“There are great issues in this country that really need time and attention,” Budd-Falen told the Daily Caller News Foundation. “I just worry that we’re so busy worrying about political correctness and we’re not focused on these other issues more pressing issues and issues that are really going to affect the future structure of energy and American rural communities.”

Geographical features in dozens of states, including California, Alaska, Alabama and Pennsylvania are impacted by DOI’s order. While the new land names are effective immediately, the public can still suggest other name changes.

“It’s unconscionable that at a time of record inflation, record high gas prices, and an unsecured border, this is what the Biden administration is focusing on,” Republican Texas Rep. Troy Nehls told the DCNF. “This is yet another attempt to rewrite history to fit the Democrats’ extremist narrative.”

“It’s a shame, and this is not what the American people want,” said Nehls.

DOI did not respond to a request for comment.

AUTHOR

GABE KAMINSKY

Investigative reporter.

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Van Jones: Biden Wants Election to Be about Trump, Not Inflation

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Monday on CNN’s Situation Room, CNN Political Commentator Van Jones stated that President Biden wants the election “to be a choice between Trump and himself” but that he needs to tell people, “I’m not just going to write you off” if you don’t vote Democrat.

Jones said, “I think he’s trying to do something that’s difficult. He wants this election, frankly, to be a choice between Trump and himself, and not just a referendum on inflation, etc. So, that’s a part of the political strategy here.”

To be clear, what Biden wants is to divert attention from his catastrophic presidency and demonize Trump and the Right as domestic terrorists, fascists, and threats to democracy. His “strategy” is fear-mongering and the politics of personal destruction.

Jones continued, giving the mentally decrepit and hateful Biden far more credit than he deserves: “What Joe Biden should be saying [to the GOP] is, ‘Guys, I’m not even asking you guys to become Democrats. I want you to become Republicans again. I want you to actually be true to your best values. You are the party of Lincoln. You are the party of Jack Kemp. I want to work with you, be your best self. I’ll fix my party. I’ve got nuts in my party, but you’ve got to be better in your own party.’ That kind of conversation from Joe Biden, I think would shock a lot of people. I think the idea that you only talk to people if you can convince them to vote for you, and if they won’t vote with you, you don’t care about them, that’s not us. That’s some new, weird stuff in America. It works on Twitter. It doesn’t work when you’re trying to run a country.”

Jones is right when he says that painting half the country as the enemy is no way to run a country. But that’s the Democrat way.

Van Jones

128 Known Connections

Jones says he became politically radicalized in the aftermath of the April 1992 Los Angeles riots which erupted shortly after four L.A. police officers who had beaten the now-infamous Rodney King were exonerated in court. “I was a rowdy nationalist on April 28th,” says Jones, “and then the verdicts came down on April 29th. By August, I was a communist.”

In early May 1992, after the L.A. riots had ended, Jones was dispatched by LCCR executive director Eva Patterson to serve as a legal monitor at a nonviolent protest (against the Rodney King verdicts) in San Francisco. Local police, fearful that the event would devolve into violence, stopped the proceedings and arrested many of the participants, including all the legal monitors. Jones spent a short time in jail, and all charges against him were subsequently dropped. Recalling his brief incarceration, Jones says: “I met all these young radical people of color. I mean really radical: communists and anarchists. And it was, like, ‘This is what I need to be a part of.’ I spent the next ten years of my life working with a lot of those people I met in jail, trying to be a revolutionary.”

To learn more about Van Jones, click here.

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The Biden Administration Says U.S. Not in a Recession, but Federal Statutes Say Otherwise. Who is Right?

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Is the U.S. economy in recession? The answer is, paradoxically, both easier and more complicated than you might think.

As expected the United States posted negative growth for the second consecutive quarter, according to government data released on Thursday.

“Real gross domestic product (GDP) decreased at an annual rate of 0.9 percent in the second quarter of 2022, following a decrease of 1.6 percent in the first quarter,” the US Bureau of Economic Analysis announced.

The news prompted many outlets, including The Wall Street Journal, to use the R word—recession, which historically has been commonly defined as “economic decline during which trade and industrial activity are reduced, generally identified by a fall in GDP in two successive quarters.”

The White House does not agree, however, and following the release of the data, President Biden said the US economy is “on the right path.”

The comments come as little surprise. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen had recently hinted that the White House would contend the economy wasn’t actually in a recession even if Q2 data indicated the economy had contracted for a second consecutive quarter.

“There is an organization called the National Bureau of Economic Research that looks at a broad range of data in deciding whether or not there is a recession,” Yellen said. “And most of the data that they look at right now continues to be strong. I would be amazed if they would declare this period to be a recession, even if it happens to have two quarters of negative growth.”

“We have a very strong labor market,” she continued. “When you are creating almost 400,000 jobs a month, that is not a recession.”

Yellen is not wrong that NBER, a private nonprofit economic research organization, looks at a much broader swath of data to determine if the economy is in a recession, or that many view NBER’s Business Cycle Dating Committee as the “official recession scorekeeper.”

So White House officials have a point when they say “two negative quarters of GDP growth is not the technical definition of recession,” even though it is a commonly used definition.

On the other hand, it’s worth noting that federal statutes, the Congressional Budget Office, and other governing bodies use the two consecutive quarters of negative growth as an official indication of economic recession.

Phil Magness, an author and economic historian, points out that several “trigger” provisions exist in US laws (and Canadian law) that are designed to go into effect when the economy posts negative growth in consecutive quarters.

“For reference, here is the definition used in the Gramm-Rudman-Hollings Act of 1985,” Magness wrote on Twitter, referencing a clause in the Act. “This particular clause has been subsequently retained and replicated in several trigger clauses for recessionary measures in US federal statutes.”

It’s worth noting that Magness doesn’t contend the two consecutive quarters definition is the best method of determining whether an economy is in a recession, but simply points out that claims that it’s an “informal” definition of recession are untrue.

“It may not be a perfect metric, but it has a very long history of being used to determine policy during recessions,” Magness writes.

Some readers may find it strange that so much heat, ink, and energy is being spent on something as intangible as a word, which is a mere abstraction that has no value. And some policy experts agree.

“Whether [we’re] in a technical recession is less interesting to me than the following 3 questions,” Brian Riedl, an economist at the Manhattan Institute, recently said. “1) Are jobs plentiful? (Yes – good) 2) Are real wages rising? (Falling fast – bad) 3) Is inflation hitting fixed income fams? (Yes – bad.)”

Others contend that definitions matter, and that by ignoring the legal definition of recession, the Biden White House can continue to argue that the US economy is “historically strong” even as economic growth is negative, inflation is surging, and real wages are crashing.

As Charles Lane recently pointed out in the Washington Post, words have power. He shares a colorful anecdote involving Alfred E. “Fred” Kahn, an economist who served in the Carter Administration who was instructed to never use the words “recession” or “depression” again.

In 1978, Kahn — a Cornell University economist in charge of President Jimmy Carter’s inflation-fighting efforts — said that failure to get soaring prices under control could lead to a “deep, deep depression.” Carter’s aides, perturbed at the possible political fallout, instructed him never to say that word, or “recession,” again.

We don’t know whether this instruction stirred the wrath of Kahn, a verbal stickler notoriously disdainful of cant and euphemism; in a previous government job, he had sent around a memo telling staff not to use words like “herein.”

It did trigger his wit, though: In his next meeting with reporters, Kahn puckishly said the nation was in “danger of having the worst banana in 45 years.”

Lane’s anecdote about Kahn is instructive because it reveals something important about these debates. While they may have a certain amount of importance as far as political spin goes, they are meaningless as far as economic reality is concerned. Substituting the word “banana” for recession did not change economic conditions or the economic outlook one bit, which no doubt was precisely Lane’s point.

My colleague Peter Jacobsen made this point effectively earlier this week.

“[You] don’t need a thermometer to feel if it’s hot outside,” he wrote. “Economic issues, especially inflation, top the list of concerns for voters going into the 2022 midterms, and it isn’t particularly close. So officially defined recession or not, it doesn’t really matter.”

Moreover, Jacobsen explains, macroeconomic data like GDP have historically been the tool of politicians and bureaucrats, who use them to justify economic interventions.

“When GDP numbers fall below a certain level, politicians can use that data to try to push income back up. Or perhaps when the economy is ‘running too hot’ politicians can use fiscal and monetary policy to slow down the economy.

All of these metaphors about economies running hot or stalling are based on a central planning view of the economy. In this view, the economy is like a machine which we can adjust to bring about the proper results. Without macroeconomic statistics, central planners have fewer means by which to justify particular interventions. We can’t claim we need stimulus if we can’t point to some data indicating it’s necessary.”

The takeaway here is an important one. We don’t need “bureaucratic weathermen” telling us when the economy is good or bad anymore than we need them “managing” the economy with the money supply, which is precisely how we got here in the first place.

So while the debates over the R word are likely to continue, it’s important to remember it doesn’t really matter if you call this economy a recession or a banana. The fundamentals speak for themselves.

AUTHOR

Jon Miltimore

Jonathan Miltimore is the Managing Editor of FEE.org. His writing/reporting has been the subject of articles in TIME magazine, The Wall Street Journal, CNN, Forbes, Fox News, and the Star Tribune. Bylines: Newsweek, The Washington Times, MSN.com, The Washington Examiner, The Daily Caller, The Federalist, the Epoch Times.

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Inflation Hits Yet Another Record High As Americans Feel The Squeeze

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Inflation climbed 9.1% over the past 12 months, the highest year-over-year percentage increase since December 1981, the Department of Labor (DOL) announced Wednesday.

The Consumer Price Index (CPI) increased 1.3% between May and June, according to the DOL report released Wednesday. Economists had predicted that CPI would increase by 1.1% last month and 8.8% over the 12-month period ending in June.

“The energy index rose 7.5 percent over the month and contributed nearly half of the all items increase, with the gasoline index rising 11.2 percent and the other major component indexes also rising,” the DOL said in their report. “The food index rose 1.0 percent in June, as did the food at home index.”

The White House preemptively downplayed the inflation data, saying the metric was already outdated as prices have begun to supposedly decrease.

“June CPI data is already out of date because energy prices have come down substantially this month and are expected to fall further,” White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said on Tuesday.

“I don’t think that number peaks until September and I think at that point it will be in double digits,” E.J. Antoni, research fellow for Regional Economics at The Heritage Foundation told the Daily Caller News Foundation.

Wednesday’s report follows a steady stream of negative polling for President Joe Biden, including one New York Times survey that found a majority of Democrats would prefer the 79-year-old not run in 2024. Voters have cited the economy and inflation as major issues ahead of the midterms.

The gasoline index rose 11.2%, while the food at home index increased 10.4%,  year over year, BLS reported. Almost all aspects of American purchases increased in June, including shelter, airline fares, new and used cars and trucks, medical care, household furnishings and operations, recreation and clothing, according to BLS.

CPI surpassed the Federal Reserve’s 2% target in May 2021 and has continuously climbed higher and higher since, according to federal data.

AUTHOR

MAX KEATING

Contributor.

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