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Higher savings, covid assistance checks, and cheap credit led to higher consumer spending in the second half of 2020. This lasted through the higher inflation in 2022 when consumer spending outpaced inflation by two percentage points. The share of monthly income set aside for savings dropped from a high in April 2020, to 7.5% in December 2021, to 3.4% in December 2022. This is rapidly reversing with increase in mortgage rates and interest rates by the Fed to 4.75%, home and car sales the lowest in a decade. Inflation is at 5% year over year and wages up 4.6% in December year over year. The labor market is tight with about 10 million unfilled jobs and unemployment at 3.4%. Tech and other companies that overly expanded during the pandemic and are under antitrust oversight are laying off some employees. A recession is possible but this depends on how Jay Powell at the Fed reads the employment situation so that it brings down inflation but not so much that it hurts American workers. ...

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Republican Senate Minority leader Mitch McConnell has differences with Mr. Trump. He made this clear in recent years on many issues and has remained silent on the Trump indictment. He is the senior senator from Kentucky.

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Problems for women and for childcare in Germany after the Merkel administration's failure to invest in child care. This DW.com report looks at this problem. Mothers have to send their children to grandparents or pay for expensive private day cares and nannies if they are able to do this. If they are not able to do this the mother usually reduces her work hours or delays returning to her job entirely. A German Youth Institute DJI study is cited which shows that in 2020 49% of parents with children under age three said they require child care. Of these only 24% were able to secure a place at a child care center for the necessary hours. For children over age three 97% needed childcare and only 71% said the necessary hours were covered. This problem was bad before the pandemic, during the pandemic it has only become much worse for women. A similar problem is happening in the US, so that this problem has consequences for women in both the EU - in Germany, France, Italy- as well as the US. It places additional burdens on women with children in the workplace. ...

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The U.S. Fed, America's central bank, barrs bank buyback of shares and limits dividend payouts to quarterly profit. The Fed does this as it warns banks they could sustain heavy losses of $700 billion for soured loans if the economy is slow to recover over several quarters, and unemployment remains high. The Fed's latest stress test for banks included the impact of the coronavirus epidemic. At this time the Fed says banks are healthy and this is protective action to keep the banks in safety.

Another sign of the changes taking place in finance and banking- swift action by the U.S. central bank leadership to stop early any potential improper behaviour of banks to do debt buybacks or dividend payout not meeting rules related to profit. 

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The large stimulus effort in Canada is about $382 Canadian dollars or $300 billion U.S. dollars for help to families, workers and businesses. It is about one fifth of Canada's total economic output. This has helped Canadian banks RBC and TD avoid major loan losses. 

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This article in the Economist describes the hard fought election in New Hampshire where two women Mrs Ayotte, a Republican, and Mrs. Hassan, a Democrat, will have spent $100 million by the time the campaign is over. Both have distanced themselves from the presidential candidates, particularly Mrs. Ayotte. The race in the state is  critical because Democrats can retake the Senate majority with a win in New Hampshire, along with a win in Illinois and Wisconsin.

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Surprising strength in the US economy is leading Fed chairman Jay Powell to consider a half point rate increase.

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Takaichi Sanae calls snap election with 62% favorability rating Jan 2026. For decades few prime ministers of Japan had such a high rating. Sanae now has the chance to get an absolute majority in parliament.

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Iranian public reaction to the air strikes Feb 28 2026 and death of Khamanei- disconnect with the government policies and economic hardship caused by lack of focus on development and modernization of the Iranian economy.

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The Federal Reserve acts to help freexzing credit markets with a $200 billion program called the Term Securities Lending Facility, where the Fed will lend safe treasury money such as Treasury securities for 28 days to banks and financial institutions and will accept nongovernment mortgage backed securities with premium credit ratings as collateral. Its a creative move by the Fed and the size of the move $200 billion should help the cash squeeze that is hitting all parts of the credit markets even those where the risks may not be as high as they are presumed to be because in this market with lack of information on who owns what of risky securities and the complexity of the securties all credit is being maligned.

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Puerta Vallarta and American expatriates 2026. WSJ reports in Feb 25, 2026 that most of the Mexican states and the Cancun, Tulum, Puerta Vallarta and other coastal tourist areas are controlled by different drug cartels. 

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The U.S. Federal Reserve gives banks 2 more years to sell their stakes in private equity, venture capital and hedge funds under the Volcker Rule. This extends the deadline for divestiture to 2017 from 2015. The reason given is that it will reduce the disruptive effects of large divestitures on markets.

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Different perspectives on the "zero tolerance" policy implemented by Martin O'Malley when he was Mayor of Baltimore during 2000-2006, are described here by WSJ's Laura Meckler. O'Malley sees the policy as having reduced crime in the city, yet David Simon a reporter for the Baltimore Sun, who created the HBO series 'The Wire,' sees this differently. The HBO series was critical of the Mayor and painted a less flattering picture of the city, showing city leaders and institutions not tackling the real problems facing the city. Following the riots in Baltimore the conflicting versions of progress and lack of progress are emerging. Simon says the pressure on the police to show reduced crime led to arrest of people for minor offences.