Insights

This month's newsletter is posted. See Newsletters at this page top. I welcome any feedback.

Republicans really have the demographics against them and if they have any chance at doing better in the Senate and White House in future years, they are swimming upstream and really need some radical changes. Think about it. Women are registered more often as...

Stocks are down nearly 2% in early trading today, which many people are taking as a sign of disappointment with the Obama victory. I don't think so for the following reasons: Economic numbers for Europe reported yesterday showed further slowing in the European economy...

I have pasted below a map from USA-Today showing the states and where they likely stand as of the last poll. Battleground states are in grey and they are mostly in the Eastern time zone, with most of the rest in the Midwest. Unfortunately, the results may be too close...

From an investor's point of view, does it matter who wins the election tomorrow? It seems everyone has a strong opinion on how critical it is for their candidate to win. In fact, a recent poll by the organization of CFAs (Certified Financial Analysts) found that 80%...

How much cash do you carry? If you're like me and many other people, almost none. I can go a week with the same $10 bill in my wallet. That's because I pay for almost everything with a debit card. Now, think about having no electricity in the stores and gas stations...

The jobs report today was generally pretty good, despite the tick up in the unemployment rate from 7.8% to 7.9%. That jump was due to more people re-entering the job market. You remember that many unemployed are not counted as unemployed when they are not actively...

I read a study today on each of the times the NY Stock Exchange has closed on what would have been a normal business day. The average result the day it next opened? - nearly unchanged. There were only two days on which it moved more than 1%. The first was after the...

I don't know how many people are paying attention to the estate tax portion of the fiscal cliff and that this election could make a huge difference on this issue. Under the fiscal cliff, now scheduled to occur in January, estate taxes rise from 35% to 55% with the...

The first estimate of 3rd quarter GDP (Gross Domestic Product) is in. This is the measure of US economic growth. It was expected to be 1.8%, up from the previous quarter's 1.3% but instead came in at 2%. There are a number of reasons not to get too excited about this...