Edward Conard

Top Ten New York Times Bestselling Author

  • “Unintended Consequences provides a provocative interpretation of the causes of the global financial crisis and the policies needed to return to rapid growth. Whether you agree or not, this analysis is well worth reading.” - Nouriel Roubini, New York University; Chairman, Roubini Global Economics
  • “…a comprehensive explanation of the modern economy.” - Julian Robertson, Founder, Tiger Management
  • “…challenges misconceptions that distort our economic debates.” - Arthur Brooks, President of the American Enterprise Institute
  • “Unintended Consequences offers deep and well-argued analyses on almost every issue.” - The New York Times
  • “…serious thinking for serious thinkers. …a thought-provoking blueprint for growing middle- and working-class incomes.” - Mitt Romney, former Governor of Massachusetts
  • “…serious thinking for serious thinkers. …a thought-provoking blueprint for growing middle- and working-class incomes.” - Mitt Romney, former Governor of Massachusetts
  • “A full-throated defense of economic dynamism.” - The Wall Street Journal
  • “…a fresh argument for the productive value of inequality.” - David Autor, Professor of Economics, Massachusetts Institute of Technology
  • “…a fresh argument for the productive value of inequality.” - David Autor, Professor of Economics, Massachusetts Institute of Technology
  • “…a must-read for serious students of economic policy.” - Glenn Hubbard, Dean, Columbia Business School, and former Chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers
  • “…a must-read for serious students of economic policy.” - Glenn Hubbard, Dean, Columbia Business School, and former Chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers
  • “…reminds us that inequality sends a signal of what society lacks most, in America’s case, entrepreneurship and risk taking.” - Lawrence Lindsey, CEO, The Lindsey Group, former Director of the National Economic Council
Upside of Inequality Oxford Unintended Consequences

Macro Roundup


Friday, June 5, 2026

AI Summary. Young college graduates in occupations that can be done remotely saw a 0.65 percentage point larger rise in unemployment than trends among older workers in those jobs or young workers in non-remotable jobs would predict, driven by involuntary and persistent unemployment. The authors estimate remote work explains 64% of the increase in unemployment among young college graduates.

Natalia Emanuel, Emma Harrington, and Amanda Pallais National Bureau of Economic Research
Date Posted:
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Remote junior workers received 18% less feedback than their non-remote peers. The unemployment uptick in “remotable” roles during the pandemic persisted, and explains 64% of the increase in unemployment of young college grads btw 2017–2019 and 2022–2024.

Does remote work explain rising unemployment among young college graduates?

Core argument: Young college graduates in remotable occupations saw a 0.65 pp greater increase in unemployment than trends among older workers in remotable occupations or young workers in non-remotable occupations would predict, in a triple-difference regression.

Figure Xb presents results from a triple-difference regression comparing the change in the age gap in unemployment across remotable and non-remotable occupations. Young college graduates in remotable occupations experienced a 0.65 pp greater increase in unemployment than would have been expected based on trends among either older workers in remotable occupations or young workers in non-remotable ones. This differential is robust to controlling for occupations’ exposure to generative AI and its potentially heterogeneous effects across age groups. This figure also shows that the differential increase is driven by involuntary and persistent forms of unemployment, not voluntary job leaving nor temporary layoffs. A back-of-the-envelope calculation indicates that, between 2017−2019 and 2022−2024, remote work can explain 64% of the increase in unemployment among all young college graduates, many of whom enter remotable jobs. For this calculation, we scale our triple difference estimate (0.65 pp) by the share of young graduates in remotable jobs (61%); this would predict a 0.4 pp increase in all young college graduates’ unemployment, which is 64% of the realized increase of 0.63 pp.

Takeaways by Macro Roundup® AI

  1. Young college graduates in remotable occupations saw a 0.65 pp greater increase in unemployment than trends among older workers in remotable occupations or young workers in non-remotable occupations would predict, in a triple-difference regression.
  2. A back-of-the-envelope calculation scaling the 0.65 pp estimate by the 61% share of young graduates in remotable jobs indicates remote work can explain 64% of the 0.63 pp rise in young college graduates' unemployment between 2017–2019 and 2022–2024.
  3. The differential increase in unemployment is driven by involuntary and persistent unemployment rather than voluntary job leaving or temporary layoffs, and is robust to controlling for occupations' exposure to generative AI and its potentially heterogeneous effects across age groups.

Related Articles:

  • AI and Young-adult Jobs: The Real Mystery — Employment rates have declined for young adults both with and without college degrees, with non-degree holders faring marginally worse, and employment growth for young workers of all education levels has lagged that of other workers. Artificial intelligence can replace some lower-skilled jobs, but those jobs are too few to drive youth labor market weakness.
  • What the Data Says About Pandemic School Closures, Four Years Later — Among school districts with similar poverty levels, remote learning was associated with greater declines in student achievement, and a district-level analysis found community poverty rates and the length of school closures had roughly equal effects on outcomes. For each week spent remote, students in poor districts experienced steeper math losses than peers in richer districts.
  • Recovering from Covid — The authors find scant evidence of lingering pandemic effects on macroeconomic dynamics or on aggregate and sectoral growth, with the COVID shock and its anomalous dynamics largely gone. Estimated trend growth rates for consumption and employment in periods with a 4.1% unemployment rate are highly correlated, while industrial production reflects a long-term growth slowdown.

AI Summary. SpaceX is preparing to reserve as much as a quarter of its $75bn initial public offering float for individual investors, which would be the largest retail allocation attempted in a megacap listing. Retail investors hold about 42% of Tesla's public float, versus 34% for Apple.

Ryan McMorrow and George Steer Financial Times
Date Posted:

The SpaceX IPO will likely have the largest retail allocation ever, with banks reserving 25 to 30% of the $75B float for retail. Historically, in large offerings, retail is allocated 5 to 10%. Small investors hold ~42% of Musk’s Tesla.

Can retail investors claim a quarter of a record IPO float?

Core argument: SpaceX is preparing to reserve as much as a quarter of its $75bn IPO float for individual investors, which would be the largest retail allocation ever attempted in a megacap IPO, according to people familiar with the move.

SpaceX is preparing the largest retail allocation ever attempted in a megacap IPO, with Elon Musk seeking to reserve as much as a quarter of the company’s $75bn float for individual investors. According to people familiar with the move, the billionaire chief wants to place small shareholders near the centre of the rocket and satellite group’s ownership from the outset, reflecting Musk’s longstanding preference for retail investors over Wall Street institutions. Small investors hold about 42% of Tesla’s public float, compared with 34% for Apple, the second-highest of the Magnificent Seven stocks, according to data from S&P Capital IQ. They have, in turn, helped bolster Tesla’s shares, which trade at 382 times trailing earnings, even as growth has slowed.

Takeaways by Macro Roundup® AI

  1. SpaceX is preparing to reserve as much as a quarter of its $75bn IPO float for individual investors, which would be the largest retail allocation ever attempted in a megacap IPO, according to people familiar with the move.
  2. Retail investors hold about 42% of Tesla's public float, versus 34% for Apple, the second-highest among the Magnificent Seven, according to S&P Capital IQ data.
  3. Tesla's shares trade at 382 times trailing earnings even as growth has slowed, helped by small investors.

Related Articles:

  • SpaceX — To Boldly Raise Money Where No IPO Has Gone Before — Goldman Sachs research finds that large companies floating 7% or less of their shares at initial public offering have 54% of shares in circulation two years later, while across its full sample of listings a 24% float at debut became 69% within 24 months.
  • An AI IPO Impact Update: The AnthroPix Effect May Be $5-Trillion+ — A closed-end fund holding small private stakes in OpenAI, SpaceX, and Anthropic has more than doubled in under two weeks and trades at nearly triple its last reported net asset value. The author argues this reflects investor appetite for any exposure to pre-IPO artificial intelligence companies, which will pull money out of other assets.
  • Chart of the Day: U.S. Households at Record Equity Allocation Heading into AI IPOs — U.S. households hold a record share of their assets in equities, exceeding the dot-com and Nifty Fifty eras, while price-earnings multiples sit near all-time highs and fewer than 10 stocks account for almost 40% of the S&P 500's market value. The author argues equity ownership has become structural rather than discretionary, making markets simultaneously more stable and more fragile.

AI Summary. Scientists at Columbia University used base editing to replace individual genetic letters in the DNA of early human embryos without the damage often seen with the earlier gene-editing technology CRISPR. The technique could eventually allow parents to repair disease-causing mutations in embryos or select desired traits, a prospect some ethicists equate with eugenics.

Carl Zimmer New York Times
Date Posted:

Scientists at Columbia University successfully edited the DNA of early human embryos via a process called “base editing,” which has “unprecedented accuracy” relative to techniques like CRISPR.

Can gene editing correct embryo mutations without structural DNA damage?

Core argument: Columbia University scientists led by geneticist Dieter Egli edited the DNA of early human embryos with unprecedented accuracy, using base editing to replace individual genetic letters without the damage often observed with CRISPR.

Scientists at Columbia University have edited the DNA of early human embryos with unprecedented accuracy, an achievement that could open the way to babies engineered with particular characteristics. The prospect has fueled controversy for years. On the one hand, the technology might one day enable parents to safely repair disease-causing mutations in embryos. But it might also be used to select desired traits — a practice that some ethicists have argued is nothing short of eugenics. Dieter Egli, a geneticist at Columbia University who led the research, called for a public conversation about the pros and cons of altering embryonic DNA. “As a scientist, you can provide the data for discussion, but then essentially there you stop and let others take over,” he said. With a newer technology called base editing, Dr. Egli and his colleagues were able to meticulously replace individual genetic letters in sequences of DNA without causing the damage often observed with an earlier form of gene editing, CRISPR.

Takeaways by Macro Roundup® AI

  1. Columbia University scientists led by geneticist Dieter Egli edited the DNA of early human embryos with unprecedented accuracy, using base editing to replace individual genetic letters without the damage often observed with CRISPR.
  2. The embryo-editing advance might one day enable parents to repair disease-causing mutations in embryos, but could also be used to select desired traits, a practice some ethicists have argued is nothing short of eugenics.
  3. Dieter Egli called for a public conversation about the pros and cons of altering embryonic DNA, saying scientists can provide the data for discussion and then let others take over.

Related Articles:

  • World First: Ultra-Powerful CRISPR Treatment Trialled in a Person — A biotechnology company reported that a gene-editing treatment designed to correct the mutation behind chronic granulomatous disease, an immune disorder, restored a crucial enzyme's function in two-thirds of one patient's neutrophils with no serious side effects a month later. The results have not been peer-reviewed, and researchers say it is too soon to judge success.
  • Ancient DNA Reveals Pervasive Directional Selection Across West Eurasia — Analysis of ancient DNA from 15,836 West Eurasians estimates selection coefficients at 9.7m genetic variants and finds pervasive directional selection, including increases in genetic scores for light skin pigmentation and negative selection against variants linked to type 2 diabetes risk and psychoses such as schizophrenia and bipolar disorder.

AI Summary. Artificial intelligence company Anthropic is helping the US National Security Agency deploy its Mythos model for offensive cyber operations, with roughly half a dozen engineers embedded inside the agency to guide use of the technology and customize models, according to people familiar with the arrangement.

Cristina Criddle and Demetri Sevastopulo Financial Times
Date Posted:

The National Security Agency is using Mythos in offensive cyber operations despite Anthropic’s ongoing legal battle with the Pentagon.

Are AI companies embedding engineers to support offensive cyber operations?

Core argument: Anthropic has embedded about half a dozen forward-deployed engineers inside the US National Security Agency to guide use of its Mythos AI model and customize models for specific applications, according to two people familiar with the arrangement.

Anthropic is helping the US National Security Agency deploy its powerful Mythos AI model for offensive cyber operations, embedding engineers inside the agency despite an ongoing legal battle with the Pentagon. The San Francisco-based company had installed about half a dozen staff within the NSA as so-called forward-deployed engineers to guide the use of the technology and customize models for specific applications, two people familiar with the arrangement said. It remains unclear whether Anthropic’s engineers are assisting the NSA in active operations.

Takeaways by Macro Roundup® AI

  1. Anthropic has embedded about half a dozen forward-deployed engineers inside the US National Security Agency to guide use of its Mythos AI model and customize models for specific applications, according to two people familiar with the arrangement.
  2. Anthropic is helping the National Security Agency deploy Mythos for offensive cyber operations while the company remains in an ongoing legal battle with the Pentagon.
  3. Whether Anthropic's engineers are assisting the National Security Agency in active operations remains unclear.

Related Articles:

  • Misanthropic: On Mythos, Bad Human Behaviors and Systems Vulnerabilities — Anthropic reports that its Mythos model has detected thousands of high-severity cyber vulnerabilities, including ones found by chaining multiple obscure software weaknesses, and that these hacking skills are emergent rather than a designed capability. Mythos completed a corporate network attack simulation estimated to take an expert over 10 hours, which no other frontier model had solved.
  • China’s Own Mythos Is Coming — America Must Prepare — The authors argue the US can extend its estimated seven-month lead in artificial intelligence by closing gaps in export controls: halting all AI chip exports to China including less advanced models, curbing smuggling networks, blocking cloud and remote access to controlled chips and US models, and restricting chipmaking equipment.
  • White House Opposes Anthropic’s Plan to Expand Access to Mythos Model — The White House opposes Anthropic's proposal to extend access to its Mythos artificial-intelligence model to roughly 70 more companies and organizations, which would raise the total with access to about 120. Officials cited security concerns about a model capable of conducting cyberattacks, and doubts that Anthropic has enough computing power to serve that many users without degrading government use.

AI Summary. China views itself as winning the race in advanced manufacturing, and leads in sectors including batteries and autos, while the US government is betting that artificial intelligence will substantially enhance its power. Chinese leaders emphasize industrial output rather than treating AI as the transformative force reshaping geopolitics.

Chris Miller Financial Times
Date Posted:

Chris Miller argues that Beijing believes its lead in advanced manufacturing advantages China vis-a-vis the US. Washington, in turn, believes the US edge in AI will dramatically increase US power relative to Beijing.

Do China and the US bet on different sources of power?

Core argument: China believes it is winning the race for advanced manufacturing, and in key sectors such as batteries and autos it is.

China believes that it is winning the race for advanced manufacturing — and in key sectors such as batteries and autos, it is. Silicon Valley types talk of being “AGI pilled” — a reference to the film The Matrix — when referring to the belief that AI will become increasingly capable and economically transformative. The US government seems to be betting that AI will dramatically enhance US power, too. Beijing doesn’t appear worried. When Chinese leaders talk about “great changes unseen in a century,” they’re not talking about AI transforming geopolitics. Instead of being AGI-pilled, Xi and other Chinese leaders are industrial output-pilled. The next year will test which of these approaches is more valuable.

Takeaways by Macro Roundup® AI

  1. China believes it is winning the race for advanced manufacturing, and in key sectors such as batteries and autos it is.
  2. The US government appears to be betting that AI will dramatically enhance American power, echoing Silicon Valley's "AGI pilled" belief that AI will become increasingly capable and economically transformative.
  3. Xi Jinping and other Chinese leaders are "industrial output-pilled" rather than AGI-pilled, invoking "great changes unseen in a century" without reference to AI transforming geopolitics, and the next year will test which approach is more valuable.

Related Articles:

  • How Should We Measure Economic Power? — The authors argue profits measure economic power because they show a firm can do what others can't, and by that metric U.S. firms dominate globally—with Japan and Europe significant and China second-tier—implying greater U.S. power than GDP or industrial output comparisons suggest. The gap favoring the U.S. is most pronounced in high-tech products.
  • How Much Is Donald Trump Costing America’s Economy? — Excluding artificial-intelligence-related categories, US non-residential fixed investment has contracted at roughly a 3% annual rate over the past year, versus average growth above 5% in the prior decade, running about $130bn below trend and cutting GDP growth by roughly 0.4 percentage points. Credit remains plentiful, with tight corporate bond spreads.
  • China’s Next-Generation Industrial Policy — China's export growth is concentrated in upstream, higher-tech goods: exports of intermediate inputs rose 26% and capital goods 32% between 2021 and 2024, while consumption goods exports were broadly flat. This shift embeds China deeper in global production systems and aligns with its long-running import substitution strategy of localizing entire value chains.

Monday, June 8, 2026

AI Summary. The authors estimate that AI coding tools raise developers' task-level productivity by about 40% with autocomplete, 140% including synchronous agents, and 180% with asynchronous agents, with larger effects for less active developers. Gains attenuate up the production chain: synchronous agents raise lines of code 741% and pull requests 65% but releases only 20%.

Mert Demirer, Leon Musolff and Liyuan Yang National Bureau of Economic Research
Date Posted:

Event studies indicate that adoption of AI coding tools raised “commits” (saved code updates) ~180%, but releases by only ~30%. Large upstream productivity gains thus far show only modest translation into shipped and used software.

How much do AI coding tools raise code writing versus shipping?

Core argument: AI coding tools raise developer task-level productivity measured by commits by roughly 40% with autocomplete, about 140% cumulatively with synchronous agents, and 180% with asynchronous agents through agent-authored commits.

Our results are summarized in Figure 1. We find that AI coding tools substantially increase developer task-level productivity, with effects that grow across successive generations of tools. Focusing on the number of commits [saved code changes], autocomplete increases task-level productivity by approximately 40%; the cumulative effect including sync agents rises to approximately 140%; and additional use of async agents raises it to 180% through agent authored commits. These effects are larger for less active developers. The results point to a substantial productivity shift in software development with the rise of agentic AI tools. [Yet] our estimates across the layers of the production hierarchy reveal a clear pattern of attenuation. After adopting AI tools, developers write substantially more code and work on more features, but this translates into much smaller increases in shipped software. Sync agents lead to a 741% increase in lines of code and a 65% increase in pull requests, yet releases rise by only 20%. Autocomplete shows the same pattern: a 228% effect on lines of code attenuates to 36% on commits and just 10% on releases. AI tools appear to relax upstream constraints in producing and publishing software, but developers must still test, polish, and iterate toward market fit, and these higher-level tasks may remain constrained [once] AI lowers the cost of writing code.

Takeaways by Macro Roundup® AI

  1. AI coding tools raise developer task-level productivity measured by commits by roughly 40% with autocomplete, about 140% cumulatively with synchronous agents, and 180% with asynchronous agents through agent-authored commits.
  2. Productivity gains attenuate up the production hierarchy: synchronous agents increase lines of code by 741% and pull requests by 65%, yet releases rise only 20%.
  3. Autocomplete shows the same attenuation pattern, with a 228% effect on lines of code falling to 36% on commits and 10% on releases, and estimated effects are larger for less active developers.

Related Articles:

  • Commoditization, Orchestration, and the New AI Stack — The author argues that as incremental gains from larger AI training runs shrink, the return on additional computing power falls, weakening the case for the training spending that dominates data center demand. Survivors of model commoditization will be those owning the orchestration layer or the applications where outcomes are priced.
  • America Is Experiencing A Productivity Miracle — America's post-2019 productivity acceleration came largely from professional services and management—about 10% of output and heavy users rather than producers of new technology—and from oil and gas. The information industry grew productivity around 6% annually, no faster than its 2000-19 average, with its output share steady at 5.3–5.5%.
  • Attention (And Money) Is All You Need: Why Universities Are Struggling to Keep AI Talent — The annual compensation gap between top industry and academic artificial intelligence researchers widened from roughly $294,000 to $1.5m, coinciding with accelerating academic out-migration toward large incumbent technology firms. Researchers who move to industry cut paper production by about 63% while increasing patent filings nearly sixfold, consistent with a shift from open science toward proprietary innovation.

AI Summary. Measuring developer productivity by software lines of code captures output rather than value, and AI inflates the metric by generating boilerplate, wrappers, tests, and speculative code at near-zero cost. More code also creates liabilities through added maintenance, complexity, attack surface, and debugging load.

Paul Kedrosky Applied Complexity
Date Posted:

Anthropic data shows Mythos drove an 8-fold increase in mean lines of code per developer. Kedrosky cautions against measuring output over value: “The best engineers create value by writing less code, not more.”

Do lines of code measure developer productivity?

Core argument: Kedrosky argues an 8x increase in software lines of code generally corresponds to a far smaller increase in actual engineering throughput, since AI agents generate boilerplate, wrappers, tests, and what-if code at near-zero cost.

[Kedrosky warns a new Anthropic paper based on internal data on increased developer productivity, as measured by software lines of code (SLOC) per developer measures output, not value]. Ten thousand lines of generated code are often less valuable than deleting a thousand lines of technical debt. SLOC as a measure rewards quantity, not usefulness. AI systematically inflates the metric. Agents generate boilerplate, wrappers, tests, and what-if code at near-zero cost. An 8x increase in SLOC generally corresponds to a far smaller increase in actual engineering throughput. Code volume creates liabilities. More code means more maintenance, complexity, attack surface, and debugging load. The best engineers create value by writing less code, not more. Most evidence is about implementation, not automating research. The strongest results involve coding, experiment execution, and debugging. Recursive self-improvement depends on solving an unsolved problem.

Takeaways by Macro Roundup® AI

  1. Kedrosky argues an 8x increase in software lines of code generally corresponds to a far smaller increase in actual engineering throughput, since AI agents generate boilerplate, wrappers, tests, and what-if code at near-zero cost.
  2. Kedrosky warns that an Anthropic paper using internal data measures developer productivity by lines of code per developer, a metric that captures output rather than value and rewards quantity over usefulness.
  3. Kedrosky notes that more code brings more maintenance, complexity, attack surface, and debugging load, and that the strongest evidence covers coding, experiment execution, and debugging rather than automated research, leaving recursive self-improvement dependent on an unsolved problem.

Related Articles:

  • Claude Code is the Inflection Point — Claude Code authors 4% of public GitHub commits, and the authors project it will reach 20%+ of daily commits by the end of 2026 and drive revenue growth that lets Anthropic outgrow OpenAI. They argue falling costs and rising quality of AI tokens have inverted the coder-tool relationship.
  • We’re Using So Much AI That Computing Firepower Is Running Out — Surging AI demand is straining computing capacity: Anthropic's Claude programming interface recorded 98.95% uptime over a 90-day span, below the 99.99% software companies typically promise, as its annualized revenue run rate climbed from $9bn to $14bn to $30bn. The company has capped how much usage customers can consume during weekday peak morning hours.
  • Commoditization, Orchestration, and the New AI Stack — The author argues that as incremental gains from larger AI training runs shrink, the return on additional computing power falls, weakening the case for the training spending that dominates data center demand. Survivors of model commoditization will be those owning the orchestration layer or the applications where outcomes are priced.

AI Summary. Revenue per employee is rising for the largest seven US technology companies and falling for small-cap companies, while profit margins are rising for those seven and flat for the rest of the S&P 500. There are not yet signs that AI is boosting revenues or profit margins outside that group.

Torsten Sløk Apollo
Date Posted:
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Net the Mag 7, revenue per employee for the S&P 500 has been flat and for smaller firms, falling. Sløk points to the higher cost of capital, and notes “there are not yet signs that AI is boosting revenues or profit margins outside the Mag 7.”

Are AI gains spreading beyond the largest technology companies?

Core argument: Revenue per employee is rising for the Magnificent 7 while falling for small-cap companies, with no sign yet that AI is boosting revenues or profit margins outside the Magnificent 7.

Revenue per employee is rising for the Mag 7 and falling for small-cap companies. Profit margins are rising for the Mag 7 but flat for the S&P 493. The bottom line is that Fed hikes and higher all-in yields continue to bite for companies with weaker credit fundamentals, and there are not yet signs that AI is boosting revenues or profit margins outside the Mag 7.

Takeaways by Macro Roundup® AI

  1. Revenue per employee is rising for the Magnificent 7 while falling for small-cap companies, with no sign yet that AI is boosting revenues or profit margins outside the Magnificent 7.
  2. Profit margins are rising for the Magnificent 7 but flat for the S&P 493.
  3. Fed rate hikes and higher all-in yields continue to bite for companies with weaker credit fundamentals.

Related Articles:

  • The Record Divide Between Corporate Profits and Worker Pay — Labor's share of gross domestic income fell to 51%, the lowest since records began in 1947, while profits' share rose to 12.1%, the highest since 1950. Inflation-adjusted hourly wages are up 3% since the end of 2019, compared with a 50% rise in profits.
  • Competitive Advantage Period: The Neglected Value Driver — Data indicate persistence in returns on invested capital has increased since 2000, with large companies the main beneficiaries; the information technology sector's aggregate return was 19% versus a 10.8% median from 1970 to 2024. Of about 13,800 U.S. public firms listing from 1976 to 2019, 18% survived.
  • Have We Entered an Era of High Productivity Growth? — Labor productivity has grown solidly while the San Francisco Federal Reserve's total factor productivity index, which adjusts for the equipment and technology workers use, has grown modestly, suggesting gains so far reflect better tools rather than broader advances. A regime-switching model puts the probability of a high-productivity regime at 57% using labor productivity and 21% using total factor productivity.

AI Summary. U.S. job gains have averaged 188,000 a month over the past three months while the unemployment rate has held steady at 4.3%, challenging the view that an immigration crackdown lowered the pace of hiring needed to keep unemployment stable.

Matt Grossman The Wall Street Journal
Date Posted:

The American economy added ~500,000 jobs btw March and May, the strongest stretch of job creation in two years. The unemployment rate was steady at 4.3%, suggesting the breakeven rate may not have fallen.

Is the job growth needed to hold unemployment steady higher than thought?

Core argument: U.S. job gains averaged 188,000 a month over the past three months while the unemployment rate held steady at 4.3%, suggesting the labor market's neutral gear may not be as low as economists had thought.

The resurgence poses a puzzle for economists. Many came to believe that the immigration crackdown had pushed the economy into a new, more sedate equilibrium, where even a trickle of new jobs each month would be enough to employ an American workforce whose growth had slowed substantially. The country, some economists proposed, simply didn’t need to create hundreds of thousands of new jobs a month anymore to keep the economy stable, a trend called a falling break-even rate of job creation. If that downshift were happening, slower job creation wouldn’t lead to more unemployment—but weaker growth and a less dynamic economy would likely follow. More recent data is calling that conclusion into question. Job gains have averaged 188,000 each month over the past three months. At the same time, however, the unemployment rate hasn’t really fallen. Instead, it has been steady at 4.3%—signaling that the labor market’s neutral gear might not be as low as economists had thought.

Takeaways by Macro Roundup® AI

  1. U.S. job gains averaged 188,000 a month over the past three months while the unemployment rate held steady at 4.3%, suggesting the labor market's neutral gear may not be as low as economists had thought.
  2. Many economists had concluded that the immigration crackdown lowered the break-even rate of job creation, meaning slower hiring would suffice to employ a workforce whose growth had substantially slowed.
  3. Under the falling break-even thesis, slower job creation would not raise unemployment, though weaker growth and a less dynamic economy would likely follow.

Related Articles:

  • Labor Force Growth, Breakeven Employment, and Potential GDP Growth — Slowing net immigration could cut US labor force growth so much that the breakeven pace of job creation falls to nearly zero — under 10,000 jobs a month — far below any point in the past 65 years. Monthly payroll declines as large as 100,000 would then not be unusual even with output at potential.
  • The U.S. Job Market is (Still) Inflationary — Prices for locally produced U.S. services are rising about 1–1.5 percentage points faster than in the years just before the pandemic, leaving underlying inflation as far from the Federal Reserve's goals as it was three years ago. Prices for manufacturing components and data-center-related loaded circuit boards have also risen.
  • A Changing Job Market Leans Against Men — The share of men aged 16 and over who are employed has fallen from a 1990s average of 70.9% to 64.1%, partly reflecting an aging population, while women's employment share has held up better at 54.5%. Healthcare and social assistance, where women outnumber men three to one, drove recent private-sector job gains.

AI Summary. The US Department of Agriculture confirmed two more detections of New World screwworm in Texas, bringing the total to four and raising concern the parasitic fly is spreading in the largest cattle-producing state. The detections add pressure on a US beef industry already facing tight supply, with the domestic herd at a 75-year low.

Ilena Peng Bloomberg
Date Posted:

The US Department of Agriculture confirmed two new cases of New World screwworm in Texas, bringing the total number of cases to four. The US’s domestic cattle herd is at a 75-year low.

Is a parasitic pest spreading through the largest cattle-producing state?

Core argument: The US Department of Agriculture confirmed two additional New World screwworm cases in Texas, bringing total detections to four in the biggest cattle-producing state and raising concerns that the parasite is spreading.

The US Department of Agriculture confirmed an additional two cases of New World screwworm in Texas, bringing the total number of detections to four and raising concerns that the parasite is spreading in the biggest cattle-producing state. The parasitic fly was detected in a calf in La Salle County and a dog in Andrews County; early reports indicate the dog was recently in Mexico. [The screwworm brings] more worries for a US beef industry already struggling with supply tightness as the domestic herd has dwindled to a 75-year low.

Takeaways by Macro Roundup® AI

  1. The US Department of Agriculture confirmed two additional New World screwworm cases in Texas, bringing total detections to four in the biggest cattle-producing state and raising concerns that the parasite is spreading.
  2. The screwworm was detected in a calf in La Salle County and a dog in Andrews County, with early reports indicating the dog had recently been in Mexico.
  3. The screwworm detections add to pressures on a US beef industry already facing supply tightness, with the domestic herd down to a 75-year low.

Related Articles:

  • Flesh-Eating Pest Confirmed in U.S. Cattle — The New World screwworm, a fly whose larvae feed on the flesh of livestock and other warm-blooded animals, has been detected in a Texas calf — the first U.S. cattle case since its eradication in the 1960s — prompting a quarantine zone and release of millions of sterile flies.

AI Summary. Failures in India's medical entrance exam and other testing problems have sparked a viral satirical online campaign demanding the education minister's resignation, with its founder calling the episode evidence of government incompetence. Under-30s make up about half of India's 1.4bn people, and a university report found nearly 40% of graduates aged 15-25 and 20% of those aged 25-29 are jobless.

Andres Schipani, Jyotsna Singh and Michael Stott Financial Times
Date Posted:

There is widespread outrage in India after results of the nation-wide medical entrance exam were voided because answers were leaked prior to the test. 2.2mm applicants were competing for 130,000 slots.

Are exam failures and youth joblessness fueling discontent in India?

Core argument: Nearly 40% of Indian graduates aged 15–25 and 20% of those aged 25–29 are jobless, according to a March report by Azim Premji University in Bengaluru.

It has also helped spark a rare challenge to Modi in the form of the Cockroach Janta Party, a viral new satirical online campaign whose creator has called for a mass demonstration to demand the education minister’s resignation. Party founder Abhijeet Dipke, who is based in Boston but plans to return to New Delhi on Saturday, has said the medical entrance exam fiasco along with other leaks, marking mistakes and system failures demonstrate the “sheer incompetence and failure of the government.” Under-30s make up about half of India’s 1.4bn people — the world’s largest youth population — and according to a March report by Azim Premji University in Bengaluru, nearly 40% of graduates aged 15-25 and 20% of those aged 25-29 are jobless.

Takeaways by Macro Roundup® AI

  1. Nearly 40% of Indian graduates aged 15–25 and 20% of those aged 25–29 are jobless, according to a March report by Azim Premji University in Bengaluru.
  2. Under-30s make up about half of India's 1.4bn people, the world's largest youth population.
  3. The Cockroach Janta Party, a satirical online campaign founded by Boston-based Abhijeet Dipke, has called for a mass demonstration demanding the education minister's resignation, with Dipke citing the medical entrance exam fiasco, leaks, marking mistakes and system failures as government incompetence.

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