In one of her book's many striking findings, Quart writes that according to a Pew study, "Before the 2008 crash, only one-quarter of Americans viewed themselves as lower class or lower-middle class. No longer. After the recession of 2008 . . . a full 40 percent of Americans viewed themselves as being at the bottom of the pyramid."

...

"In Montreal," where day care is government subsidized, it costs "$7 to $20 a day. That makes a huge difference for families." Figured annually for 50 weeks a year, five days a week, people in Montreal pay $1,750 to $5,000 per year on child care.

By comparison, Quart says that here, "many of the families I spoke to, who were ostensibly middle class, were spending around 20 to 30 percent of their income on day care." Annual averages in the US range from "$10,468 for a center-based child-care program to $28,905 for a nanny."

Problem with the U.S. is health, child care, and education, have exploded with inflation (i.e., most of inflation that occurs in the economy) because of lack of constraints in the cost structure (As well as counter-productive government subsidies). Yet, all these things are included in government public spending in most developed countries. At this point, probably the only way to reverse the trend without leaving large chunks of the population out in the cold is to provide a full public option for all of these areas, with aggressive cost control, but means-tested. This would then separate out the private sector so it can be more efficient, and costs would go down generally, because both the public and private subsectors would predominate towards pro-efficiency incentives (provided the details aren't mucked up, of course).

Everyone's bottles, bags and food packages add up. Factories have churned out a cumulative 8.3 billion metric tons of new plastic as of 2017

...

The world's plastic problem has been building for decades. Since mass production began in the early 1950s, annual output has grown from about 2 million tons to 322 million produced in 2015, the authors said. Current production rates are exceeding our ability to dispose of the stuff effectively--and supply is expected only to grow. "Without bold new ideas and management strategies, current recycling rates will no longer be met, and ambitious goals and timelines for future recycling growth will be insurmountable," they wrote.

...

As the industry matured and the negative effects on public health and the environment became clear, China got more selective about the materials it was willing to buy. A "Green Fence" law enacted in 2013 kept out materials mixed with food, metals or other contaminants. Exports consequently dropped off from 2012 to 2013, a trend that continued until last year, when the world's biggest buyer warned that its scrap plastic purchases would stop altogether.

But the judge's decision adds fodder to the political fight over the independence of the CFPB, which was established after the financial crisis to safeguard Americans against predatory financial institutions.

The CFPB declined to comment.

The American Bankers Association, which has advocated for reining in the CFPB, said the implications of the decision "remain unclear," because other federal courts have ruled differently.

In my view, this widely held wisdom is based on a profound misreading of economic and political reality and trends in the U.S. and around the world. I believe that a looming global recession and fear of deflation will lead the Fed to cut rates instead and reinstate quantitative easing, or QE, causing U.S. bond yields to fall.

First, it is important to understand that the 2008 financial crisis was never resolved. Aggressive fiscal- and monetary-policy tools--extremely low rates and multitrillion-dollar bond-buying programs--helped contain the crisis. But they didn't fix the problem. The global economy has been stabilized, but fundamental weaknesses remain.

An economic reckoning may surface as soon as the next few months.

In the U.S., second-quarter economic data look strong. But that is misleading. There are plenty of indications of weakness, including slowing sales of cars and houses, and a decline in mortgage refinancing. The cumulative effect of interest-rate hikes, frozen levels of real income, and rising oil prices will also weigh on the public's buying power.

In the corporate sphere, the boom in stock buybacks, which in May reached an astounding $174 billion, comes directly at the expense of capital investment that would boost economic growth. A potential global trade war is also detrimental; the U.S. dollar's weakness in 2017, combined with reinvigorated economies throughout the world, contributed immensely to U.S. exports...

June's interest-rate hike was most likely the last in the current cycle. The next major move by the Fed could be to lower rates, followed by more QE. The realization that this is happening will bring about a dramatic change in investors' views and will return U.S. bond yields to the 1.5%-2% level. The development, I believe, will be rapid and surprise a financial system dramatically underweight long-term bonds.

As we say, "happy times are here again" -- almost nonstop since 2009. So this editorial is bold call -- but it has really been a "bipolar" economy since the 2008 crisis; with every person able to see whatever they want to see in the mixed data... at some point, a clear trend will likely manifest...

The decision removes the sales-tax savings that consumers could reap by making purchases online instead of buying from local brick-and-mortar shops. Although the move does help to level the playing field for physical small businesses, it also places new burdens on small online retailers.

Some small business groups argue the decision will be burdensome and add to an already confusing tax structure. The nonpartisan Small Business & Entrepreneurship Council said the ruling will add stress for small businesses, the marketplace and internet entrepreneurs.

...

"The fact that small businesses must now act as tax collectors for thousands of separate state and local [jurisdictions] is outrageous."... "Unfortunately, this ruling makes sweeping changes to sales tax law, but provides nothing in the form of easing complexity and/or streamlining each states' processes."

The Supreme Court should have required some mitigating factor (such as the tax-collecting ability being based on having a certain amount of business in the state) to mitigate the Dormant Commerce Clause concerns. Now they've gone completely in the other direction purely out of apparent concerns for the big guys "getting away with it".

The number of high net worth individuals (HNWI) -- which Capgemini defines as those having investable assets of $1 million or more (excluding primary residence, collectibles, consumables and consumer durables) --  grew almost 10 percent, or 1.6 million, to 18.1 million in 2017.  

"High net worth individuals around the world enjoyed investment returns above 20 percent for the second year in a row," Anirban Bose, head of Capgemini's financial services global strategic business unit, said in a statement. The report's analysis confirms that "global HNWI wealth would exceed $100 trillion by 2025," Bose wrote

Sounds reaaaal sustainable...

But Subran and other international trade experts warn not to count China out too quickly.

"The first thing to observe here is that China is not a country of laws -- it's an authoritarian dictatorship... so from that opening point, China is potentially able to play much, much dirtier than the United States," said Jacob Kirkegaard, a senior fellow at the Peterson Institute for International Economics, who warned that American businesses could take the punishment for Trump's antagonism.

"He will essentially force the Chinese government to retaliate in other ways -- and those other ways can be much more costly to American firms," he said. "That belief is premised on a fundamentally erroneous assumption about how the modern economy works... and a lack of concern with how engaged American businesses are involved already in China."

Underwriting is not nearly as bad as in 2006--2007 yet, but it appears the trend is what it always has been, when the economy is strong and there is too much capital, underwriting standards fall down, and then the stage is set for a bad outcome when the economy goes bad. It is typically 10--12 years between collapse of the last crash and then credit quality deterioration and the next credit collapse. We are at 10 years. Dodd Frank had rules to try to avoid a replay of 2008 in CMBS, but a lot of loans now are made by private equity funds that are not subject to these regulations.

One thing that is immutable is that as each generation comes into Wall Street, they think they know better how to do it, and they eventually do the same dumb loans in pursuit of profits and bonuses. It has never been different. We are not about to have a major crash again, but CMBS loan quality is deteriorating now, and one day in the next 2--3 years, it will be a bad problem. When they start doing a lot of CDOs and virtual CMBS pools with derivatives, then that is a sure sign the end is near.

...

And this might just be the opening act for a theme that could endure for at least 12 months. While the Fed is expected to deliver up to two more rate increases in 2018 and further hikes next year, the ECB just ensured it won't move until the latter half of next year at the earliest.

...

The government has recently been issuing a lot more debt to finance its deficit, much of it in the form of Treasury bills that are sold to investors. But to find sufficient buyers, the Treasury has had to pay higher rates on Treasury bills. This helped attract money out of the federal funds market into Treasury bills, and in turn that caused the fed funds rate to move higher and closer to the top of its range.

This caught the Fed's eye. The central bank, according to analysts, wants to avoid a situation in which the fed funds rate moves above the Fed's target range. "The Fed doesn't want anyone in the market to think it's not in control of overnight rates," Lou Crandall, chief economist at Wrightson ICAP, said. "It might worry some people if it went above the upper band''

Seems like the Fed doesn't have a clue how this post-2008 jalopy of a monetary system works...

... from the jump, it's pretty clear Judge Leon thinks AT&T's ideas about the future of content are pretty good, while the DOJ's complaints about antitrust are pretty boring...

In a country where net neutrality has just been repealed, owning the internet connection is a huge advantage, just like owning the cable network would be. All of this is, of course, extremely obvious to anyone who has used a phone to watch anything in the past decade. It's not clear how Judge Leon thinks any of this actually works, or if he realizes AT&T is the country's largest wireless internet provider...

...

This is the third bank that settled with state attorneys general for illegally influencing the Libor. Barclays, Deutsche Bank and now Citibank have been fined $420 million collectively.

Citibank agreed to comply with ongoing investigations into other banks' Libor cases.

Darius Brawn, a hedge fund veteran who previously worked as a portfolio manager for SAC and Citadel, told CNBC he thinks $10 billion is a conservative estimate. He cites Tesla's plans to ramp up its Model 3 production, build new factories, make a new Roadster, Semi trucks and a Model Y vehicle, and to embark on large-scale production of its glass solar roof tiles.

...

Brawn, who has shorted Tesla personally, points out that it's highly unusual for a growth company to cut its planned investment spending, as Tesla did last quarter from $3.4 billion to under $3 billion... Without raising additional capital, Brawn said, the electric vehicle maker has enough cash to last for only a few quarters.

...

"I do not believe Wall Street investment banks are willing take the massive reputational, legal and financial risks associated with underwriting billions of dollars of new securities for [Tesla]" [Said Gabe Hoffman].

He and other bears also believe Tesla may not even be able to conduct an equity offering because of the existence of an undisclosed, and ongoing, enforcement action by the SEC. This action was discovered through FOIA research

...

Venezuela could emerge as the first country where a cryptocurrency effectively replaces a government-controlled paper currency. And that would encourage other people around the world to also seek shelter in bitcoin.

... [but] Venezuela isn't the only country with major money problems.Just look at Argentina. Last year, its official inflation rate hit 25%. The year before, it was 37%. This means that everyday goods and services in the country are 71% more expensive than they were at the start of 2016.