From the Asbury Park Press:
There’s more to NJ’s labor shortage than unemployment benefits. Here’s why
It’s been more than a year since Ken Gaughran lost his job in radio promotions due to the pandemic, and he is slowly losing hope of getting back into that field.
So in recent months, the 27-year-old Toms River resident has searched for employers that offer a decent wage and benefits, all while wondering how long he can wait before he needs to search for a restaurant or retail job.
“We all had our careers, now what are we going to do?” Gaughran said. “They’re gone. That’s been the toughest part.”
If Gaughran sounds confused, he’s not alone. New Jersey’s labor market continued to emerge from its pandemic freeze in June, gaining thousands of jobs and convincing more unemployed workers to get off the sidelines.
But the state’s job growth doesn’t appear to be fast enough to bring relief to employers who have struggled to find enough staff to operate.
And a state report provided little clarity about what the post-pandemic economy will look like. Will workers surge back into the labor force in September when schools reopen and enhanced federal unemployment benefits expire? Or are they in the same boat as Guaghran, wondering if their careers are gone?
First
Man, Windows/PC ecosystem is just garbage.
Need to do some Windows based work, decided to upgrade my desktop. Thing was ancient, like Core 2 Duo era. That said, it was maxed out, running SSD, etc.
New PC, Win 10 Pro. WTF this is just as slow as my 15 year old computer. It’s been running updates for like 12 hours now, almost completely unusable when its happening. Probably half a dozen restarts already.
Won’t keep my BT Mouse and Keyboard connected. Why is it so impossible to connect BT peripherals without having to connect the wired keyboard and mouse first? Every time it disconnects, I need to plug another mouse in to reconnect.
Crashed updating a driver or something?
Holy christ my 2011 Mac runs circles around this, and just works. (i5 2.7, 16gb)
Why is this so slowwwwwwwwww.
FRONTLINE: aired 7-13-21
“The Power of the Fed
Entore 48 min worth a listen but 48:30 and 51:30 particularly interesting.
https://www.pbs.org/video/the-power-of-the-fed-zzeu12/
Newark airport floods again. . .
Anyone seeing massive flooding in their areas lately from these crazy summer rainstorms? I believe it is unacceptable that NJ has flooding problems. Even our “suburban” areas are set within extensive and expensive urban infrastructure. Well-publicized high taxation. It is ridiculous that the state doesn’t tackle our flooding issues with more infrastructure.
On a personal level, anyone ever have a backwater check installed? Ever done so in a multi where you cannot control water usage during flooding conditions?
https://nypost.com/2021/07/18/newark-international-airport-cancels-delays-flights-amid-flooding/
Crushed regarding your backflow preventer is that on the sanitary side or city water side. I’ve been thinking about a check valve on the sanitary side as the city has a collapsed sewer line the are not eager to fix, if they don’t run a jet every so often it backs up into the multi. Was thinking of putting a check valve in but my get stuck with tissue and stuff and not really work
Ever see the plans for the Army Corps of Engineers flood tunnels to Newark Bay?
40 foot diameter, 20 mile tunnel.
Was estimated to cost about $2 billion in the 90s, it’s probably $20 billion today.
Backflow check on a sewer line is asking for problems. It would need to be accessible enough to clean every few months, as well as to be able to replace the check mechanism easily.
Walking . . .
I am considering installing a backwater check to protect against backflow from city sanitary sewer. The sales guys say that the installation would include an access hatch so it can be snaked easily and can be even emptied at the valve with gloved hands. So, regarding the clogging issue that you mentioned, it seems like it can be avoided with routine maintenance, and I believe that.
However, the sales guys downplay the potential of people in the property using their water (flushing toilets, taking showers) while the backwater check is engaged due to heavy rain flow, thus causing sewer backup. They say I have enough sewer line before any fixture would be impacted but obviously they are not hydrological engineers and that their perspective is a “sales” perspective is my concern and that a real “technician” would disagree about the risk. I’m going to try to calculate how much water usage would create a sewer spill before I buy or not, but I was wondering if anyone has dealt with this.
Urban nj – urban gutter lines connected some into the storm water sewer line, some connected into the sanitary sewer. Not enough capacity in the lines due to the crazy rain we get lately in the summers. I’m thankful that at least the downtown Newark business district, for example, handles flooding rain well. But, urban residential neighborhoods can be hilarious with flooding rain sometimes.
40 foot diameter and 20 miles long is amazing to imagine.
Even at $20 billion, it would create wealth if it took 200,000 homes out of flood zones, assuming that removing a “flood zone” designation from a property results in it being worth $100k more. I don’t know it there are 200,000 homes in flood zones in NJ, but still such infrastructure can likely maybe somewhat be value-justified.
Notorious Nine . . .
I’m sure the below has been posted here before, but interesting Sunday morning read summarizing the bi-partisan and dumb decisions that put NJ in its current disastrous fiscal trajectory.
The authors forgot:
#10 Abbott Supreme Court ruling
#11 Mount Laurel ruling
#12 NJ Supreme Court ludicrous green light to Murphy to borrow $5B without voter referendum due to COVID
https://www.njpp.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/09/NJPPNotorious9Sept2016.pdf
Phoenix posted on Friday…… I am willing to answer questions. I will make two points. The first 35 minutes is re-hash, and then it leads to no conclusion. It is basically a cop out. We have been discussing these points for years here. The only part I really appreciate is Kashkari here….for the 60 seconds from 49 to 50. Within the window you directed us to….
https://youtu.be/9RbL8lTsITY?t=2940
Nomad says:
July 18, 2021 at 7:55 am
FRONTLINE: aired 7-13-21
“The Power of the Fed
Entore 48 min worth a listen but 48:30 and 51:30 particularly interesting.
https://www.pbs.org/video/the-power-of-the-fed-zzeu12/
To be clear, the tone of that thing is alarmist, but the documentary should have not wasted so much valuable space on rehash, and had someone on the talk about MMT (Kashkari’s comments are in this area), and also giving The Fed’s actions context relative to what is happening around the world.
I know that I made the comment several weeks ago that we have not had normally functioning fixed income markets since roughly 2003. This fact that the writers of this piece saw fit to go back all the way to the financial crisis to provide insight into 2020-21 lends credence to my opinion in my mind.
No One…. thoughts?
Kashkari made an interesting point.
“I find these questions amusing, cause I hear them all the time from wall street. And these are folks who DONT ACTUALLY CARE about what is happening on Main street.”
So the poor districts ask him help us find work. Only thing he can do is lower interest rates, and the Wall street crowd moves in like a big dog and eats all the food leaving the crumbs for Main street, who they “Don’t actually care about.”
Like NoOne said to Pumpy,
“We hang in different circles than you Pumps.”
I visited the Museum of American History yesterday in Philly. Nothing we do today even tries to resemble what these documents were attempting to do when they were written.
This country is becoming the same turd it claimed to be running from, only it’s worse now. One thing I found interesting was something not learned in grade school growing up. What exactly was the “Stamp Tax” all about? Was it more about the tax, or the “Proclamation line” that stopped the advance westward, leaving some land for the Indians?
“Indians’ animosity to two groups of Americans: fur traders and land thieves.”
“One common method of obtaining pelts at a favorable price was to trap natives in debt.”
“Traders frequently used alcohol to lure Indians into signing fraudulent land deeds. In this they joined a crowded field, for territorial encroachment was another of the Indians’ principal grievances. Land fever pervaded colonial society. It infected individual settler families as well as large-scale speculators, such as George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, and Benjamin Franklin, all of whom dreamed of acquiring title to thousands of western acres and then dividing them up into smaller parcels for profitable sale.”
Land thieves and trapping natives in debt? Nope, Americans haven’t changed their tactics or become better individuals in over two hundred and fifty years.
That last 2 minutes is what I have been saying for years on this blog. The FED has been doing a fabulous job given what they are up against. 3b is always cheering on a crash to asset pricing like housing when he has no comprehension of the consequences that come with that. He also always cries about the low rates. What exactly do you want them to do when they are battling serious deflation? Raise rates and set the dominoes in place for falling economic growth and asset prices falling into a deflationary spiral that once takes hold of the psychology of the market, no amount of printing could stop…it will run its deflationary course destroying everything in its path.
Stability is the key. You want to try and prevent society from destroying itself. No stability=Pure chaos. Laws of society and the economic system, none of it matters without stability.
Nomad says:
July 18, 2021 at 7:55 am
FRONTLINE: aired 7-13-21
“The Power of the Fed
Entore 48 min worth a listen but 48:30 and 51:30 particularly interesting.
https://www.pbs.org/video/the-power-of-the-fed-zzeu12/
Epinephrine is the primary drug administered during cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) to reverse cardiac arrest. Epinephrine increases arterial blood pressure and coronary perfusion during CPR via alpha-1-adrenoceptor agonist effects. However, the dose, timing and indications for epinephrine use are based on limited animal data. Recent studies question whether epinephrine provides any overall benefit for patients.
The available clinical data confirm that epinephrine administration during CPR can increase short-term survival (return of pulses), but point towards either no benefit or even harm of this drug for more patient-centred outcomes (long-term survival or functional recovery). Prospective trials are needed to determine the correct dose, timing and patients for epinephrine in cardiac arrest.
The same could be said for low interest rates.
This is the bottom line. It’s easier to go against inflation than it is to go against deflation. Inflation is the lesser of two evils under our current economic system.
We can embrace deflation, but that means totally changing the economic system we currently use. In order to use an economic system based on falling prices, you have to change how consumption and products are divided up…aka how money is made and how it is used. It’s an economic system that can’t be based on the labor market of today.
LW,
What you posted yesterday, spot on. Received notice of complaint a few days ago.
Surprise, surprise.
Capitalism as we know and use today, can’t function on falling prices. It can’t. That means you a business is paying someone more today than they can sell for tomorrow. It will fall on its face.
America is heading into Cardiac Arrest. The epi (low interest rates) is to make it look like it has a pulse. But you can only push so much. The hands and feet are now dusky and blue, not unlike our flag.
It’s pretty inevitable now.
The whole avoid deflation mantra is complete BS. It’s akin to constantly moving goalposts. We inflate, and create a new baseline that we consider armageddon if prices fall below that. We blow up the stock market to over 3x the 2008 highs but must take action if there is a 10% decline?
“But the single most important reason for the British government’s unprecedented decision to leave ten thousand troops in North America after the Seven Years’ War was not to guard the colonists against Indian incursions. Just the opposite. It was to protect the Indians from the colonists.”
So, the American revolution was because the colonists were angry that Britain was charging them and using the money to protect the Indians from being over run by the colonists.
Guess you could claim the same argument over having to pay for a police force that is working against your best interest.
“There are armed roving gangs of BMX bikes, quads and motorcycles terrorizing NYC. It’s like Mad Max.”
Things like this have to be written in the history books and put into museums.
Picture a gang member’s motorcycle in a darkened room on display with an interactive touch screen depicting his role in an upcoming revolution.
The plaque could read,
“Here is one of the foot soldiers at the time, riding his two stroke internal combustion horse at the run up to the take over of Manhattan island. Notice the tattoo markings on his arm, that depict the tribe he belongs to. In the small of his back is where he kept his weapon at the time, a Kel Tec 9mm. Now this weapon is not common to his tribe, they generally use whatever weapons they can acquire. Using asymmetric warfare and terroristic tactics they were the nomads at that time period using whatever methods they needed to survive.”
I’d like Kashkari to provide examples of monetary policy helping poor districts.
Joyce,
He has no interest in that.
No surprise that the resident blog poster who lied about their corporate career thinks the Fed Reserve is doing a fantastic job.
Analysts have long relied on sentiment and related data on risk-taking as contrarian indicators. By the time friends, colleagues and strangers are plowing money into stocks and telling you about it, it’s time to run for cover, to this way of thinking. Likewise, when everyone is selling, you should be buying with both hands.
But for much of this year, it has paid enormous dividends to stay with the herd. It’s the latest departure from the tried and true in a year that already has brought soaring meme stocks, record lumber prices and a bond-market rally in the face of rising inflation. In short, now is when analysts and portfolio managers are starting to wonder whether it really is different this time.
“We’ve been throwing up our hands for a while,” said Jason Goepfert, president of Sundial Capital Research. “For whatever the reason, the market is just rolling over all these historical indicators that before had a very consistent track record.”
https://www.wsj.com/articles/record-stock-rally-ignores-wall-streets-phobia-about-optimism-11626600781?st=xi91sgqj7bffyj1&reflink=article_copyURL_share
How bad has your life been since 2008? How bad should have it been if the FED f’ed this up? You had a child born in 2008, which would have been a depression had the FED done nothing or got it wrong, having never lived through bad economic times and they are almost done with high school. Thanks to the FED’s understanding of the economic system, this child lived their entire life in good times.
3b says:
July 18, 2021 at 12:15 pm
No surprise that the resident blog poster who lied about their corporate career thinks the Fed Reserve is doing a fantastic job.
But cheer on hell on earth because you want to see housing prices crash. Did your sibling or friend make a ton of money in real estate that it has consumed you with hate?
When the trap door opens, Pumps is going to be the first one questioning why the FED did not orchestrate a soft landing. When the U.S. Dollar is worth 20 cents, he will question why did they paper over everything? Baa. Baa.
Lib: It’s all about him. He has no concern for the younger and future generations. As long as he perceives himself to be doing well, that is all that matters. Again, he is the only one on this blog that cheers the Fed. It says it all!! Until of course like you said it all collapses and he will be crying where was the Fed.
Private Israeli spyware used to hack cellphones of journalists, activists worldwide
Military-grade spyware licensed by an Israeli firm to governments for tracking terrorists and criminals was used in attempted and successful hacks of 37 smartphones belonging to journalists, human rights activists and others, according to an investigation by The Washington Post and 16 media partners.
“This is nasty software — like eloquently nasty,” said Timothy Summers, a former cybersecurity engineer at a U.S. intelligence agency and now director of IT at Arizona State University. With it “one could spy on almost the entire world population. … There’s not anything wrong with building technologies that allows you to collect data; it’s necessary sometimes. But humanity is not in a place where we can have that much power just accessible to anybody.”
Pegasus is engineered to evade defenses on iPhones and Android devices and to leave few traces of its attack. Familiar privacy measures like strong passwords and encryption offer little help against Pegasus, which can attack phones without any warning to users. It can read anything on a device that a user can, while also stealing photos, recordings, location records, communications, passwords, call logs and social media posts. Spyware also can activate cameras and microphones for real-time surveillance.
“There is just nothing from an encryption standpoint to protect against this,” said Claudio Guarnieri, a.k.a. “Nex,” the Amnesty Security Lab’s 33-year-old Italian researcher who developed and performed the digital forensics on 37 smartphones that showed evidence of Pegasus attacks.
PBS Frontline is still a quality production, but chicagofinance is correct in that hour long episode was mostly rehashing.
3b/lib,
Why do you want so badly to crash the economy. Why not let the FED do what it is doing? If they keep it going like they are doing, isn’t that a win? If it crashed in 2008 or crashes now because the FED is unable to work their magic, wtf is the difference?! Why would you not try?
Go ahead and study history, which Revolution was really worth it for the people alive at the time? How did the French Revolution go? How bout the Russian Revolution? How bout the Chinese Revolution? Extreme hell and chaos for what? Did the avg individuals life improve that much, that it is worth watching people get massacred?
If the FED let the system crash in 2008 instead of trying to prevent pain, the crashing economies might have set off a period of dark ages, where society stops progressing, like the end of the Roman Empire.
So again, why are you guys in favor of doing nothing and letting it all crash? Why? Please tell me why.
I love how 3b thinks he is helping the future generations by crashing real estate and the economy. You are one of a kind.
Is your life that bad right now? Has it been bad since 2008? So what are you crying about?
Since 2008, minus the bs politics, life has been good. Stable. If Trump and Obama never came to town riling people up, this would have been a spectacular past decade. Stability was awesome.
What I’m getting at. I’m sick of people dwelling on fear and negative bs. Life is really good right now, and no one appreciates it. I guess that is what happens with a media and political machine focused on selling fear. Either that, or some people just can’t be happy.
“Life is really good right now, and no one appreciates it.”
If you are a teacher, that is.
But then again, to a narcissist, life only revolves around their sphincter.
How is it that companies with billions to spend like Apple and Google cannot make their phones secure?
Are they stupid? Or complicit?
And just imagine if you have access to the cell phones of the most powerful bankers in the world, I’d bet you would know which stocks to buy better than the all powerful, all knowing, most superior being in the world, the infamous Cathie Wood.
As investors, one of the data points we should pay attention to is household debt levels.
When household debt levels get too high, we run the risk of creating an asset bubble and experiencing an asset pop.
The latest data from the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System shows that household debt service payments as a percent of disposable personal income are at a 40-year low!
As someone who is bullish on the housing market, this data is music to my ears.
Notice how the percentage ticked up years leading up to the Dotcom collapse in 2000-2001 and the Global Financial Crisis in 2008-2009.
Today the household debt percentage is 38% lower than it was in 2007-2008 thanks to lower interest rates and higher median household income.
With such a low debt burden on American households, I just don’t see another major prolonged correction like in 2008. Americans are flush with cash and will likely be buying the dip.
Historically low debt levels are good for the stock market as well. Although, high valuations make me less excited.
Example Of Benefitting From Lower Rates
The current house we purchased in 2020 is 80% more expensive than a house we bought in 2005. Our new house is about 60% nicer in a quieter neighborhood.
However, our mortgage payment is roughly the same. Yet, our net worth is at least 10X greater than it was 16 years ago.
Further, if I still had a day job, I’m positive my 2021 income would be greater than my 2005 income as well. Isn’t yours?
My situation is not unique.
Millions of Americans have been able to live better thanks to lower rates. The 10-year yield continued to move down this week to 1.3%.
Check the latest mortgage rates if you haven’t recently. The average 15-year mortgage rate is now only 2.2%. But you should be able to beat that rate.
When you hear market pundits call for a collapse in housing prices because we’ve surpassed 2007 levels, they aren’t making a coherent argument.
It’s kind of like telling you to be more careful today because your net worth has surpassed levels from 14 years ago. Come on now. Even low-level inflation ensures that asset prices continue to march higher over time.
Phoenix says:
July 18, 2021 at 2:26 pm
“Life is really good right now, and no one appreciates it.”
If you are a teacher, that is.
But then again, to a narcissist, life only revolves around their sphincter.
“I believe it is unacceptable that NJ has flooding problems.”
LOL, within the 287 belt unless you’re on one of the ranges you are most likely in a current swamp, in a former swamp, or on a prehistoric lake bed.
Limited options, especially when Mother Nature drops 9″ of water on you over fourteen days…
“So the poor districts ask him help us find work.”
I liked Kashkari’s commentary, however, I suspect the pleadings of Representatives from low income Districts have much to do with actual Fed policy and more their entire inability to understand the same….
Maxine Waters knowledge of the capital markets likely rivals that of Pumpy’s…both are lucky if they can explain the most basic relationship between rates and valuation.
Absent actual knowledge, people like Waters and her ilk do what every half witted, incapable, dependent supplicant does….stick their empty hands out and say mooorrrrre…..
Much easier (and profitable) to be a dependent fool than to actually make any effort.
pleadings of Representatives from low income Districts *don’t* have much to do with actual Fed policy
Central Banks are central planners. The three biggest, US, Europe, Japan have been employing financial repression for over a decade. There are no safe positive inflation adjusted returns out there due to their policies. Savers are being punished as Keynes wanted, while gamblers and certain segments of the financial industry are supported.
Central planning ultimately goes haywire, nobody knows exactly why or how.
Who are the “experts” this state-run-media organization interviewed? The names I saw look establishment.
Phoenix, sorry to hear.
Only support I can offer is that there is eventually light at the end of the tunnel….pick a point further out in time and what you desire then and manage to that….
Helped me keep some sanity during the chaos of hand to hand combat.
Rt up to 1.33 now.
This guy eloquently explains what I have been trying to say about remote work. Absolutely knocks it out of the park with his list, esp no 4 below.
“Fourth, since about 1990 a pendulum has swung back and forth twice between working remotely and in offices. As described by Friedman and Browning as well as by Seabrook, just before Covid-19 became widespread, management preference had shifted away from home offices, and they influenced employee behavior with both carrots (the likes of onsite yoga rooms, sushi bars, and free beverages and snacks) and sticks (IBM’s 2017 edict that, per Seabrook, “everyone must return to the office or leave the company,” and a similar measure by Yahoo). That was a 180-degree change from IBM’s Smarter Workforce Institute proclaiming eight years earlier that those working from home “were highly engaged, more likely to consider their workplaces as innovative, happier about their job prospects and less stressed than their more traditional, office-bound colleagues,” and was not too similar to Bartleby’s observation that “employees have become less loyal as the pandemic has progressed,” as “workers are spending more time looking for other jobs and updating their LinkedIn profiles.””
https://worksnewage.blogspot.com/2021/03/eleven-brutal-truths-on-office-design.html?fbclid=IwAR2c7nnjw-8D9mkvEKz8odSVLhkj6q7rHanlUSPwFuMOX7hK26v0xAvVsJY&m=1
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People who lie about their career have no business commentating on WFH. They have absolutely zero understanding . And yet day in and out they come on here with drivel. Simply insufferable.
LW,
I appreciate. So many don’t understand. They think after a divorce it’s all good.
I always did. Why don’t they teach this stuff in high school?
I’d like to open a school. Call it the school of hard knocks. Get people with real life experiences to wake up the kids with reality, instead of the crap Pumpy teaches that no one cares about and no one uses.
Engineers, lawyers, doctors, police, soldiers, etc. Let them have their day and teach what life is really about. Let them learn about investing, marriage, legal issues, medicine, drugs, etc.
But not that watered down crap. The real deal.
Don’t think American families could handle it though. Too much Disney DNA.
Never knew, or forgot, that George Washington was only 23 when he crossed the Delaware. Today we treat a 23 year old like they are still children.
It’s sick. A child in Afghanistan or India learns real life lessons before American kids do.
“Today we treat a 23 year old like they are still children.
It’s sick. A child in Afghanistan or India learns real life lessons before American kids do.”
If you want to get down to it, all Americans are treated like children. Lack of fiscal responsibility leads to lack of personal responsibility. What have the boomers sacrificed in their lifetimes? Everything handed to them on a silver platter to ensure they have beautiful retirements. Debt in the trillions piled up over 20 years to keep charade going so they can cash out. Boomers would have to be dumb to not GTFO market now, all asset classes then hit beach. This has been signaled over and over again. The Fed has done everything to ensure that they feel no financial pinch over their lifetimes…so here we are. High paying jobs should be friggin easy right now with labor exiting, but it is extrememly hard to get paid middle class wage.
On Fed piece, the truth can be summarized about 7 mins by William Cohen “Everything in the markets in a confidence game. The Fed is there to provide confidence “…”they flooded markets with capital, creating the biggest easy money experiment in history of the world”
It is a con game, plain and simple. The illusion of wealth by Greenspan, Bernanke, Yellen and Powell. Everything is fine, don’t look behind curtain. Kashkari basically saying they are Jesus to the poor masses.