A Recession on the Way?

More good news for all those Very Serious People who haven’t been able to sleep at night due to Very Real Very Legit concerns (and not at all just regurgitating RW talking points) about the SPR:

https://www.energy.gov/ceser/articl...licitation-purchase-oil-strategic-petroleum-5

Hey, how much of that oil comes from Venezuela, Russia and Iran? Just wondering.

You know you can look things like this up? If you had done so you'd have found that it's basically none and wouldn't have made this post.

Hey, you ever wonder how many countries have the right equipment to refine Venezuelan crude? And which countries it is?

are you calling Venezuelans crude

I’m so glad the Cookie Monster has weighed in on the economy. Very serious people.

Biden is just trying to appeal to your generation, give him a break.

If Cookie was like "me Cookie Monster go on Subway diet like Jared!! Om, nom, nom, nom!!" FF probably wouldn't utter a peep.

I get it, puppets gotta look out for each other.

Another week another 3m barrel purchase of oil for the SPR.

https://www.energy.gov/ceser/articl...licitation-purchase-oil-strategic-petroleum-6

I hope our VERY Serious and Legitimately Concerned folks are able to sleep a little better tonight knowing that their Very Real Fears are being wrapped up.

Longest stretch of <4% unemployment since Nixon's first year in office. That's right: we haven't had that spirit here since 1969

https://bsky.app/profile/pkrugman.bsky.social/post/3kn6vb5txyc2z

How much of that is due to people getting a second or third job? How many of those jobs are government jobs?

Do you understand what the unemployment rate is?

Call me crazy, but I am not sure why people getting second or third jobs would drive down unemployment numbers. It might be arguably a sign that the economy is generically bad such that people are forced to have multiple jobs to make ends meet. But if people had 1 job, they're employed. If they have 2-3, they are still employed.

If the jobs are government jobs, that doesn't make them any less employment.

Now if you were to argue the unemployment numbers were artificially lowered by any number of means (people not reporting their actual unemployment, people working temp jobs, contract work, or side hustles that don't count as "real" jobs) that would at least be fair criticism.

It might or might not be fair, depending on what he might have to back it up. However it is amazing how often he backs up his contentions with source material that actually disproves his arguments.

If one person is working two jobs and the government is counting both jobs instead of the person then they are inflating the number. I know a judge in NYC that would not like that and would impose a hearty fine for doing that.

Reminder that FF didn't go to jail as a kid due to a government employee, so should show some fucking respect.

That’s… that’s not how the unemployment rate works.

The unemployment rate is the % of people who want full time work that don’t have it. Yes, two part time jobs can add up to full time employment but that would still only be one person counted.

In other words it is people based not jobs based. One person working a 40 hour a week job counts the same as someone working two 20 hour a week jobs.

In addition to your misunderstanding of the unemployment rate, it should be pointed out your misunderstanding of Trump's fraud.

Even if the government tallied the unemployment rate the way you mistakenly think it does, it would not matter if it kept consistent in how the rate was calculated now vs. previously.

The difference from the Trump situation was fairly clear when Trump's team would essentially simultaneously inflate the value of an asset when listing it as collateral for a loan and deflate the value of that same asset when it came to the organization's taxes. It would also overstate things categorically: one of the most cited examples was claiming Trump's apartment was 30k square feet when it was only 10. It is almost impossible for anyone but the most naive to credit such issues to innocent mistakes or differences in valuation.

P.S. I hope one day to find someone who loves me and believes as much of my BS as FF does for Trump.

Which why the banks have their own assessors who can say otherwise. Then you meet somewhere in the middle.

So like I originally suspected, it’s misleading. Par for the course for Democrats.

What are you taking about?

Just because you are an ignoramus doesn’t mean it is misleading.

Also, the same criteria had been in place (presumably) through Democratic and Republican administrations alike.

*FF walks down the street, and happens upon a squished squirrel in the road*
Democrats did this!!! But which ones!?

How on earth is using the unemployment rate to track the number of unemployed people misleading?

They're not.

Any other fictional scenarios you'd like to invent because you can't stand for America to be successful under a Democrat?

Reminds me of the Obama administration, when Republicans couldn't stand the fact that unemployment was going down so the new talking point became "you should look at the U6 rate, not the U3 rate!"

That insistence disappeared in January 2017, of course.

If this is the wrong thread or has already been addressed, … just ignore. But …, isn’t the argument that the current inflation is all Biden’s fault?