Dollars and Jens
Thursday, November 17, 2005
Thursday, November 10, 2005
oil
Some Senators have decided that the appropriate response to high oil prices is to raise taxes on oil.
This will devastate the satire industry.
Friday, November 04, 2005
payrolls
Average weekly wages were up an annualized 6.1%, which, it should be emphasized, doesn't count benefits — only cash wages. This is a couple points higher than real growth can reasonably expected to be; that difference will be a combination of inflation and an increase in the relative share of national income that goes to labor, hopefully more the latter.
The headline number is that non-farm payrolls only increased by 56,000; last month's number was revised up about 30,000, and the household survey showed an increase of over 200,000 jobs (hence the drop in the unemployment rate, which comes from the household survey).
Thursday, November 03, 2005
Unit Labor Costs
The productivity report. Unit labor costs came in slightly below last quarter, with an annualized 1.1% over the past three quarters. The year-over-year rate comes in at 2.8%, as low as it's been in a while, because of a spurt late last year.
