Archives: April 2006

Is Health Care Inflation Easing?

Posted by: Michael Mandel on April 18, Categories: Health

When I looked at this morning's PPI release from the BLS, the low numbers for health care inflation jumped out at me. Change in producer prices Mar '04-'05 March '05-'06...

Immigrants have lower unemployment than native-born

Posted by: Michael Mandel on April 14, Categories: Labor Market

Here's an astounding fact, especially given the current immigration controversy. In 2005 foreign-born workers only had a 4.6% unemployment rate, substantially lower than the 5.2% for native-born workers. That's according...

Demographics is not Destiny

Posted by: Michael Mandel on April 13, Categories: Demographics

Repeat after me Demographics is not destiny. Demographics is not destiny. Demographics is not destiny. Okay, now you may skeptically read the new study from five Federal Reserve economists, entitled...

Enron and the Press

Posted by: Michael Mandel on April 13, Categories: Journalism

This is an item which won't interest most people, I'm afraid. But it's something that I've thought a lot about. When the Enron scandal broke in 2001, there was a...

Republican Science vs Democratic Science

Posted by: Michael Mandel on April 11, Categories: Tech

Ed Felton of Freedom to Tinker has a good post about technology policy. There seem to be regularly drawn battle lines in Congress, but for the most part tech policy...

Why I Don't Care About Shipping Containers

Posted by: Michael Mandel on April 10, Categories: Tech

Marc Levinson, whom I like, has written a new book called "The Box: How the Shipping Container Made the World Smaller and the World Economy Bigger." I must admit, however,...

Odd Remark in the New York Times

Posted by: Michael Mandel on April 10, Categories: Growth

In an article today entitled "U.S. Research Funds Often Lead to Start-ups, Study Says", Steve Lohr mentions in passing that politicians and policy makers in the United States and Europe...