The much more plausible reason for somewhat more frequent downward revisions of the CES data since 2023 is that the economy is contracting faster than the BLS’s model can adapt to in real time, especially in the small-firm sector. Consequently, downward revisions (due to the birth-death model) are entirely expected. This doesn’t indicate a flaw in the BLS process per se — just a lag in modeling adjustment during a turning point in the business cycle.

The rapid economic contraction since 2023 has meant the BLS birth-death model is overestimating the number of new businesses, and underestimating closures. This causes *early* CES estimates to be biased *upward* — the complete opposite of what you think is happening.
Later, when more complete data arrives (e.g., through late reports or benchmarking to unemployment insurance records), the overestimation gets corrected — resulting in downward revisions.

It’s really great to see an informed comment on here. There was an interesting discussion of this on More or Less on the BBC, a few weeks ago.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/p...

Re Trump, I will add: there is no “if” about whether he’ll attempt to cook the books. The MO is to cook and to lie at every conceivable opportunity, and to do it all without worrying about shame or hypocrisy or anything like that, because all that matters is ego (the numbers looking good) and power (holding on to it, and exercising it).

This is such a classic example of someone spouting confidently on a topic they know nothing about. I am a lay person, and even I knew immediately that you’d written a pile of crap about government reporting.

BLS stats have long been considered the global gold standard for employment data due to their technical quality, transparency, consistency over many years, and detail, among many other things. You mention Sweden in your “counter-factual”. SCB (Statistics Sweden) is well regarded, especially for innovation. But it doesn’t hold a candle to the BLS for granularity or frequency of data.

How the fuck this gets modified as insightful is completely beyond me. Every developed nation everywhere publishes key economic statistics in two forms: an early version that is directionally useful to decision-makers whose priorities are speed over accuracy, and a later revised version that is useful to decision-makers whose priorities are accuracy over speed.

For example: central banks, market participants such as traders and analysts, hiring managers in cyclical industries — all of these prefer to get early data to help them understand and manage risks right the fuck now, because the costs of waiting a couple of months for completely accurate data are just too high.

By contrast: government budget planners, academics and economic researchers typically need the most accurate data possible, because they are working on longer term horizons.

It is simply *impossible* for some types of data to be both accurate and fast. Survey data, for example, can only be accurate with a high response rate, and respondents can’t be coerced into replying sooner than they want to (or are able to, some data just takes a while to accumulate to respond to the survey).

You people don’t *have* to be ignoramuses your entire lives. You can choose to be better humans than that, you know.

The claim wasn’t “millions of dollars to execute”. The claim was that the exploits cost millions of dollars. It’s pretty obvious that the bulk of that cost is development and testing.

I love how you ask “but where could we put the infrastructure for e-bikes/bikes?” as though this is a really difficult problem no city has ever solved, studiously ignoring what’s been done in dozens of Dutch and Danish cities, in Vienna and Paris etc and that you think infrastructure for bikes is a question of painting lanes! I suspect default US mindset is happening

Yes. And on top of that, as miles travelled shift from cars to e-bikes, that too reduces injury rates, and of course has the health benefits mentioned in the original article. Modal shift to active transport is a huge benefit

It was a bit weird to see the summary talking about the US relying on imports for 90% of its coffee - surely much closer to 99%!

Not heard of delirium tremens, then?

Thanks so much

The answer, based on death rates on those roads, is largely yes. Obviously, people walking in rural areas prefer to walk on pavements or footpaths to just on the road. But it’s still pretty damn safe, and people do brake in time, yes.

Yes please! My son would find that v useful

Ha. I live in NW London, as I said above. Literally in the same borough as you, although in my case, south of the North Circular. Yes, mate, there are some journeys in the outer boroughs which are a pain on public transport and where your hour journey on public transport vs 15 mins in a car can hold true. Obviously, networks are densest and journeys fastest when going in and out of town. But let’s be real, if you’re going into town, a car is almost always a shitty way to do it. You’re almost always much better off jumping on the tube or a Thameslink or the overground or whatever, depending on your starting point. I never even had a car until I was 43, because I lived most of my adult life in Kilburn / Hampstead / West Hampstead and a car was more trouble than it was worth. If you live in, say, Southgate or Totteridge, life is going to be much easier if you have a car for some of your journeys, but even my brother in law’s family, who live in Woodside Park, use the bus and tube for lots of their journeys, because it’s quicker and faster.

Nope. Take a look here: https://www.fama.org/wp-conten...

Page 6 explains the exemptions for fire trucks from size restrictions and Appendix B lists these in detail. Pages 12 to 17 show widths of typical trucks and you can see that they are between 98 and 100 inches in width, which is 8’2” to 8’4”. Page 10 shows that FAMA lobbies for a specific waiver for fire trucks to be up to 102” in width, which is 8.5ft.

But as I said before, it’s the combination of length and width of US fire trucks that means that US suburbs are constructed with wide roads with large turning radii. You can see lots of the lobbying arguments in this FAMA document: we need lots of water! We need big ladders! Etc. All while studiously ignoring the fact that other countries are able to deploy trucks with ladders that are just as long on shorter trucks, and don’t have problems with trucks running out of water, etc etc.

Undoubtedly more people have died as a result of the wide roads that these trucks require than have been saved by the fires they (infrequently) go and fight.

She’s just startled a new school and isn’t a confident cyclist, so a six mile ride through heavy traffic in rush hour is not on the cards for the moment. My son was nervous of cycling when he was her age, but now he’s that much older and absolutely loves getting a Lime bike around London.

TBH, I’m not even sure she could have easily got a Lime bike in the centre of town today, it was mayhem