Enlarge / Donald Trump speaks at the White House on July 11, 2019. (credit: Alex Wong/Getty Images)
Donald Trump is not a fan of Libra, Facebook's proposed cryptocurrency, the president made clear in a series of tweets on Thursday evening.
"Facebook Libra’s 'virtual currency' will have little standing or dependability.," Trump tweeted. "If Facebook and other companies want to become a bank, they must seek a new Banking Charter and become subject to all Banking Regulations, just like other Banks."
Trump is the latest—and most high-profile—public official to raise doubts Facebook's cryptocurrency plans. On Wednesday, Federal Reserve chairman Jerome Powell warned that "Libra raises many serious concerns regarding privacy, money laundering, consumer protection and financial stability."
Fans of tough-as-nails animated shoot-’em-up Cupheadhave been waiting since 2018 for Delicious Last Course, a DLC expansion with a whiff of finality about it. Unfortunately, they’re going to have to wait a little longer, because it’s been delayed to 2020. The developers offered a commitment to quality and a focus on…
The fanny pack is in the midst of a major revival.
The ultra-convenient bag (known as a “bum bag” in the UK) has long been the accessory of choice for dorks and tourists. Now it’s getting a full design and marketing makeover from fashion labels, who have rebranded it as a “waist bag,” “belt bag,” or “hip bag.” Labels from Nike to Alexander Wang are putting out their own versions, many with more refined designs than the bags have historically enjoyed.
The trend has been slowly picking up momentum on the streets and runways for a few years now, but rather than fizzling out, as in some of the fanny pack’s previous false starts toward a resurgence, it keeps getting bigger. “The industry has been buzzy about fanny packs/bum bags for a few seasons, but Q2 [2018] should be known as the quarter they finally became a hit,” noted retail technology firm Edited, which tracks millions of fashion products online, in a July 5 post. “New arrivals lifted 120% and sellouts grew 359% compared to Q2 2017.”
The bags themselves range from traditional—the typical polyester pouch with a horizontal zipper running across the face—to looking more like a luxury handbag with a belt strap. The prices are just as varied. Adidas’s branded polyester waist bag is $25, while Gucci’s metalassé-stitch leather belt bag costs $1,100 and Louis Vuitton’s monogrammed “Bumbag” in coated canvas will set buyers back $1,500.
They’re also proving able to draw customers of different genders. The bags were noticeably prominent on the women’s spring 2018 runways, for instance, but they’ve also been a major trend for men, who tend to wear them slung over the shoulder and across the chest, rather than around the waist, avoiding the unsightly bulge the pack can create. (“Looks like your belt is digesting a small animal,” Jerry Seinfeld’s character on Seinfeld said once to a fanny-pack-wearing George Costanza.)
“Fanny packs, or ‘waist bags’ as we now call them, are the fastest-growing segment in the men’s accessories market,” Marshal Cohen, an analyst with market research firm NPD Group, told the Wall Street Journal (paywall) in November. According to NPD data reported by the Journal, from September 2016 to September 2017, sales of the bags grew more than 10% to hit $100 million.
The rise of streetwear, which has featured the bags in the past, may also be helping their cause. One notably hyped fashion accessory of the last couple years is the fanny pack Louis Vuitton created in collaboration with the streetwear label Supreme. On the runway, models wore them dangling across their bodies, of course, not at their waists.
Denver police announced Friday that they had arrested a local 29-year-old Uber driver, Michael A. Hancock, on suspected first-degree murder.
Hancock is believed to have shot and killed his passenger with his Ruger SR40 in the early hours of Friday morning while they were driving down Interstate 25, a primary north-south artery in the city.
UPDATE: 29 YO Michael Hancock has been arrested for investigation of first degree murder for the early morning shooting on I-25 and Unversity. pic.twitter.com/YVvKFVy5ge
— Denver Police Dept. (@DenverPolice) June 1, 2018
According to USA Today, Hancock shot Hyun Kim, 45, after he claimed that Kim assaulted him.
QUOTE | “Part of my job involves funding content and my heart sinks when someone brings me something that’s a shooter, because a shooter is almost the lowest common denominator at this point.” - Oculus’ Callum Underwood says it’s time for VR devs to move on and consider new styles of gameplay.
This is In Real Terms, a weekly column analyzing the latest economic news. Comments? Criticisms? Ideas for future columns? Email me, or drop a note in the comments.
No matter who wins next Tuesday’s election, the president who takes office next January will be among the oldest ever elected. (Donald Trump, at 70, would be the oldest president ever elected to a first term. Hillary Clinton, who turned 69 last week, would be the second-oldest after Ronald Reagan.) Perhaps that’s appropriate — the country they are hoping to lead is getting older too. When Bill Clinton took office in 1993 at age 46 — making him the third-youngest president ever — 12.6 percent of Americans were at least 65, the traditional retirement age. Today 14.8 percent are. And by 2050, that figure is expected to rise to 22.1 percent.
The aging of the U.S. population poses major economic challenges: rising healthcare costs, more retirement spending and, crucially, fewer working-age Americans to help pay for it all. Already, economists believe, the graying of America helps explain the slow economic growth of the past decade-plus. The problem will only get worse as more baby boomers leave the workforce.
But by global standards, the U.S. is in pretty good shape. In parts of Europe, more than 20 percent of the population is of retirement age; in Japan, it is 26 percent. Those countries have the same challenges as the U.S.: a large generation born after World War II that is now at or approaching retirement, and a steep decline in fertility rates. But the U.S. has something they don’t have: a high rate of immigration.
You wouldn’t know it from this year’s overheated campaign rhetoric, but immigration is the only thing keeping the U.S. from facing a Japan-style demographic cliff. At a time when aging and other factors mean that fewer Americans are working, immigrants — who tend to come to the U.S. during their working years and have a higher rate of labor-force participation than native-born Americans — play an increasingly important role in the U.S. workforce. Foreign-born U.S. residents made up 13.1 percent of the population in 2014 but 16.4 percent of the labor force, up from 10 percent two decades earlier. Immigrants help the economy in other ways too: They are more likely than native-born Americans to start businesses, and because they pay into Social Security but only receive benefits if they stay in the country permanently, they help ease the U.S.’s long-run fiscal burden.
Perhaps just as importantly, immigrants are the reason the U.S. has a relatively high birth rate compared to other rich countries. Americans, like their counterparts in Japan and western Europe, are having fewer children. But that decline has been partly offset by the comparatively high fertility rate among foreign-born residents. A report from the Pew Research Center last week showed just how big that effect is: Immigrants account for the entirety of the increase in the number of annual U.S. births since 1970. Without them, the annual number of births would have declined.
But while immigration provides the U.S. with important economic advantages, it also poses challenges. The U.S. has experienced a half-century-long wave of immigration; the foreign-born share of the population is on track to hit a record later this century. Past periods of rapid immigration have brought conflict, and the 2016 election suggests that this time will not be different.
Some of that conflict, no doubt, is driven by racism and prejudice. But there are also economic challenges. Foreign-born U.S. residents are, on average, significantly less well-educated than native-born Americans. About 28 percent of immigrants ages 25 and up have less than a high school diploma, compared to 8 percent of native-born Americans. That means they compete for work with the least educated Americans, who already face the greatest challenges finding decent-paying jobs.
Most economists firmly reject the notion that “immigrants are taking our jobs.” By providing new customers as well as new workers, immigration increases income and employment opportunities for native-born workers, leaving everyone better off on average. But the key phrase there is “on average.” There is much less agreement among economists about how low-skilled immigration affects the wages of low-skilled workers. And it is almost certain that some individual American workers are worse off because of competition from immigrants.
If that dynamic sounds familiar, it might be because it’s very similar to the debate over another major 2016 campaign issue: trade. Trade, like immigration, helps the economy as a whole, but can harm individual workers. In fact, it is largely the same workers: Americans without a college degree. Doctors and lawyers, by and large, don’t have to worry about their jobs being shipped overseas or about being displaced by an immigrant willing to do the work for less. Factory and service workers do.
In 2014, I wrote that the immigration debate hasn’t kept up with reality — it remains focused on illegal immigration from Mexico, even as illegal immigration has fallen and Asia has overtaken Latin America as a source of new arrivals. Two years later, Trump has pushed the debateeven further from the facts, with his baseless claims that immigrants are rapists and criminals. (In fact, immigrants commit violent crimes at a lower rate than native Americans.) But perhaps when the election is over there will at last be an opportunity for an honest discussion of immigration, a critical source of strength for the U.S., but one that also poses serious challenges.
Are investors #withher?
Last week, I reported on new research from economists Justin Wolfers and Eric Zitzewitz that found evidence that financial markets are nervous about a Trump presidency. Friday afternoon’s “October surprise” from the FBI provided an unexpected chance to test that thesis.
In their paper, Wolfers and Zitzewitz observed that stock prices rose during the first presidential debate, which Clinton was widely seen as winning. Friday provided a similar experiment in reverse: Markets immediately plunged on the news that the FBI was looking into a new cache of emails that could be tied to Clinton’s private server. (Markets later rebounded somewhat as subsequent reporting made the news appear less dire for Clinton.)
The evidence for the “markets hate Trump” thesis isn’t definitive. It’s possible that investors were spooked by the increased uncertainty around the election outcome, rather than by the possibility that Trump’s prospects might improve. And even if investors do prefer Clinton to Trump, there is no guarantee that a surprise Trump victory would cause a long-term drop in stocks rather than a short-term blip. Still, Friday provided a convenient test of Wolfers’s and Zitzewitz’s theory, and it passed.
The week ahead
On Friday, the Bureau of Labor Statistics will release job and unemployment data for October, the last major economic figures before Election Day. The report will probably come too late to have much of an impact on the outcome. But it will at least provide some insight into the economic context in which voters are making their choice.
Economists expect the report to show that the economy added 178,000 jobs in October, which would represent a modest pickup from September, when employers added an estimated 156,000 jobs. (That figure will also be updated on Friday.) More generally, it would represent a continuation of the recent pattern of solid but unspectacular job growth. That is consistent with last Friday’s report from the Bureau of Economic Analysis that showed that gross domestic product increased at a 2.9 percent rate in the third quarter. That marked a significant pickup from the first half of the year, and beat economists’ expectations. But economists cautioned that the report didn’t suggest a sustained acceleration in economic growth.
Kansas, under Gov. Sam Brownback, has been running a bold test of the theory that lower taxes leads to faster economic growth. It hasn’t gone well. Brownback’s response, according to Bloomberg View’s Barry Ritholtz, has been to stop publishing a quarterly report that revealed that failure.
The current economic expansion is already among the longest on record, but that doesn’t mean the next president will necessarily face a recession, argues Neil Irwin in The New York Times. (On the other hand, simple probabilities mean a recession is more likely than not, Josh Zumbrun writes in The Wall Street Journal.)
Tyler Cowen is one of several prominent economists who has written favorably about the idea of providing a “universal basic income” to all Americans. But recently he has become more skeptical.
Local governments have slashed spending on infrastructure projects like roads and sewage systems. That’s hurting the broader U.S. economy, Eric Morath and Ben Leubsdorf report in The Wall Street Journal.
CORRECTION (Oct. 31, 7:28 a.m.): A previous version of this article incorrectly described who can receive Social Security benefits. Legal permanent residents can receive benefits, not just citizens.
Some of you will simultaneously reach for a hot dog and for your heartburn medication this 4th of July. You may be shocked to know that both can increase your risk of a heart attack.
A study published in June in journal PLOS ONE showed that the powerful acid-blocking medications called proton pump inhibitors (PPIs) were associated with a two-fold higher risk of cardiovascular death. Earlier studies revealed an increased risk of death for people taking the blood thinner Plavix with a PPI, but this new study showed the higher death rate for all. There’s also evidence that PPIs increase the risk of community acquired pneumonia, anemia, and osteoporosis. With 21 million people in the US currently using PPIs, the public health implications are staggering.
Acid-blockers can cause the very problem they are supposed to treat. These powerful acid blockers are popular, with over $13 billion in sales, because they work. Over the counter PPIs include omeprazole (Prilosec) and lansoprazole (Prevacid); several more are available by prescription. They are potent medications and can be of great help to people diagnosed with stomach ulcers or irritation (gastritis or esophagitis) while they heal. But they were never intended to be used long term. Indeed, the current recommendation is for 4-8 weeks of use.
One problem is that doctors aren’t prescribing them that way. Another is that the drug creates a physical dependence. A well-known side effect is an extremely uncomfortable rebound of stomach acid production and heartburn—in other words, acid-blockers can cause the very problem they are supposed to treat. A 2009 study (registration required) revealed that young healthy volunteers with no previous symptoms of heartburn had severe reflux when they attempted to stop taking the drug. Which means that once a person is taking these drugs for as short as 4-8 weeks, they can be incredibly hard to get off of.
As an integrative medicine physician, I often see patients who want help discontinuing PPIs. They have repeatedly attempted to stop but horrific heartburn drives them right back onto the drug. One of my patients had been on the drug for years and felt great, but she was worried about the potential side effects. The first time she tried going off, she only lasted four days. And her digestive system was out of whack for two weeks.
To help patients like her, integrative medicine practitioners work with their patients to discover and eliminate the underlying reasons for the heartburn, which can include particular foods, stress, and obesity. We might suggest a trial off of dairy, gluten, coffee, chocolate, fried foods, or alcohol. For stress, we suggest breathing practices, guided imagery, yoga or another centering practice. We work together to manage weight. If a person is trying to wean off a PPI, we substitute supplements and weaker medications, which reduces the rebound acidity.
Despite the evidence, the American Gastroenterological Association position paper on managing reflux, minimizes the risk of long term PPI use. Instead it focuses on the common recurrence of symptoms when patients attempt to discontinue.
As a nation, we put a lot faith in pharmaceuticals. According to the Mayo clinic, 70% of Americans take one prescribed medication and 50% take two. A full 20% of are on five or more medications. It is often easier to pop a pill than to say no to that yummy fried food that you know gives you heartburn. Heartburn is a classic disease of lifestyle. As an educated consumer, ask your doctor or pharmacist how long you will need to take a prescribed medication and how hard it will be to get off.
Even if you ask all the right questions, however, it often takes years before we discover unexpected side effects. Vioxx, a nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drug (NSAID), is the classic example. Released by Merck in 1999, it was recalled in 2004, after studies linked it to 38,000 cardiovascular deaths. An insulin sensitizing drug called Rezulin was recalled by the FDA in 2000 when it was found to cause liver damage and its sister drug Avandia increased the risk of heart attacks by 40%. The number of excess deaths due to acid blockers has yet to be calculated.
Medications can be lifesavers. Beginning with the introduction of antibiotics in the 1940s, to the humble use of aspirin to prevent heart attacks, to the recent advances in chemotherapy, our longevity is partly related to pharmaceutical innovations. At the same time, many experts believe this generation will be the first to have a shorter life expectancy than their parents. This is not due to a lack of available drugs, rather it’s because we don’t want to fully address lifestyle-related diseases with lifestyle change.
Let’s applaud medications as the lifesavers they can be and tackle the root causes of diseases like diabetes, high blood pressure, and heart disease with health promotion. Heartburn is a classic disease of lifestyle. The first-line treatment—and often the only treatment needed—is a change in diet and better stress management.
So enjoy that hot dog on the 4th, and then get off your PPI. It might help you live longer.
