According to my wildflower book, this is a San Diego silverpuff. According to the internet, no such species exists. That is, there are literally no results for “san diego silverpuff.” So maybe it’s a Douglas’s silverpuff, which my book says is very similar to the San Diego variety—as well it should be, since both are the exact same species: Microseris douglasii. The same species, but different. Or something. In any case, it’s kind of pretty up close.

I was over at the Conference Board site checking out consumer sentiment, and I was unsurprised to find that it’s pretty dismal: down from 98 in June to 92 in July. There’s not much to say about this aside from “what else would you expect?”

But then I browsed through the whole news release and came across something I hadn’t seen before: expectations of future inflation rates. What caught my eye is that in July the average expectation in the Conference Board’s survey for inflation one year from now is 6.1 percent. Yowza! We haven’t had inflation that high for 30 years, and over the past twelve months it’s been running at about 2 percent. Here’s a comparison of survey expections with expectations based on bond prices put together by the Cleveland Fed:

As I said, I’ve never seen this before so I’m not sure what to make of it. But what it says is that no matter how long inflation has been low, ordinary consumers insist on believing that it will go up to 4-5 percent any day now. And if something bad happens, it will go up to 6 percent.

I’m trying to think of what effect this has. What are the upsides and downsides of consumers thinking that inflation is far higher than it really is? They’ll probably feel cheated by a 3 percent raise or a 2 percent return on their savings. On the other hand, they might increase their spending if they think their money is losing value and there’s nothing they can do about it.

What else? I’m a little fuzzy this morning, but there must be more profound consequences of this disconnect.

Piero Tenagli/IPA via ZUMA

The United States isn’t the only country in trouble:

Public health officials across Europe are sounding the alarm over a resurgence of coronavirus cases as the continent’s countries ease lockdowns and international travel ramps up, with some experts warning that citizens have become too complacent.

The increase is marked in countries such as Spain, while Eastern Europe and the Balkans, which were largely spared the worst of the early pandemic, are seeing a steep increase in recorded cases….Some governments are already taking measures to slow the spread. Britain has imposed quarantine on people returning from Spain, while Germany and France have ordered mandatory testing for travelers from high-risk areas, including the U.S. Berlin is making the move as Germany, which thought it had successfully beaten back COVID-19, is experiencing a troubling rise in infections. There have been close to 4,000 new cases recorded in the past week.

These countries did the right thing and crushed the coronavirus down to minuscule levels. But it’s still out there circulating, and all it takes is one case to start a new outbreak.

Masks and shutdowns and social distancing can be relaxed a bit once the number of cases drops near zero, but only a bit. Until we have a vaccine, we have to continue doing most of this stuff. Nobody likes it, but that’s the way it is.

Here’s the coronavirus death toll through July 28. The raw data from Johns Hopkins is here. The Public Health Agency of Sweden is here.

This is the street I grew up on. It used to be lined with trees, but we lost some of them to disease and then the rest to the city, which decided about 20 years ago that it couldn’t afford to maintain them. Nor, thanks to liability reasons of some kind, would it allow homeowners to take over the maintenance. So now the whole neighborhood looks denuded.

The electric pylon in the background has always been there, but it didn’t used to glow. It does that now because Southern California Edison leased the right-of-way under the electric lines to a company that stores RVs there. The storage space is lighted with intensely bright sodium bulbs that cast an orange glow for hundreds of feet. That’s why the pylon now glows orange.

This neighborhood is almost exactly as old as me: we moved in when I was about six months old. My mother is one of the few remaining original buyers still living there.

Shawn Thew/CNP via ZUMA

Now that the Republican version of a coronavirus rescue bill is out, we can compare it with the Democratic bill passed several weeks ago. I may dive into things in more detail later, but for now let’s look at how things break down in two broad categories: aid to individuals and aid to business.

Individuals

• Democrats maintain the $600 unemployment bonus. Republicans slash it to $200.
• Stimulus checks: About the same in both bills.
• Democrats allocate $430 billion for schools. Republicans are offering only $100 billion.
• Democrats want $1 trillion in aid to cities and states. Republicans want nothing.

Business

• Republicans want to immunize businesses from COVID-related lawsuits.
• Republicans want more money for emergency business loans.
• Republicans want a new round of funding for the PPP program.
• Republicans want a 100 percent deduction for business meals through the end of 2020.

A 100 percent deduction for business meals! In the middle of a pandemic where we’re trying to persuade people to stay apart! It’s hard to think of anything more slavishly and stupidly business friendly.

The Democratic bill includes plenty of money for businesses, but the Republican bill is targeted almost exclusively at them. When it comes to money that helps individuals, either directly (UI benefits) or indirectly (schools and cities), Republicans just want to slash, slash, slash.

Here’s the coronavirus death toll through July 27. We are now above 3 deaths per million and still climbing. This did not have to happen.

The raw data from Johns Hopkins is here. The Public Health Agency of Sweden is here.

Wilfredo Lee/AP

During the Democratic debates, Kamala Harris took what I and many others considered a cheap shot against Joe Biden’s opposition to forced busing many decades ago. An article in Politico suggests she has no remorse over this, but that doesn’t worry Karen Tumulty:

The article suggests that some Biden allies fear Trump may “weaponize” (in advertisements) the debate-stage clash between Harris and Biden over his record on busing, which was the most notable moment of her failed bid for the nomination. Since endorsing Biden in March, Harris has campaigned energetically on his behalf.

This reported anxiety about Harris, however, suggests a different standard for women as running mates. They are apparently supposed to be window-dressing — demure and apologetic.

It’s hard to take this fear seriously. First of all, it happens every single election cycle, and the public inevitably yawns. Second, do you remember what Donald Trump’s opponents called him in 2016? If that didn’t cause any problems, nothing will.

I don’t think it matters much who Biden chooses, but the fact that Harris is willing to take the occasional cheap shot is a point in her favor, not against her. It shows that she understands politics ain’t beanbag.

This is the Chicago skyline taken from Interstate 90 heading east into town. It looks like storm clouds are a-brewing.

Kevin Drum

Last Friday President Trump unveiled four executive orders that he claimed would revolutionize the prescription drug industry. Let’s take a look at three of them:

• The first order clarifies that discounts under a program for low-income patients should be passed directly on to patients. This is a fine idea, but Trump’s version applies to only a tiny segment of the market.
• A second order eliminates rebates that drug companies pay to Medicare Part D plans for seniors. In other words, it raises drug prices.
• The third order allows importation of drugs from Canada. This has been underway for a while, so there was nothing new in Trump’s announcement. What’s more, Canada is still opposed since it wants to make sure Americans don’t cannibalize their supply of drugs.

Taken together, these three executive orders would have only the most modest effect. But how about the fourth order? This one would direct Medicare to base the price it pays for certain drugs to the price paid by foreign countries. In theory this might be a good idea that forces pharmaceutical companies to treat the United States more fairly. But hold your applause: it would apply only to drugs administered by physicians and Trump gave drug companies 30 days to come up with a better plan. There’s a good chance that even this limited proposal will never see the light of day.

I have not been able to find a rigorous analysis of how much these proposals are likely to affect the overall cost of prescription drugs. At a guess, though, the first two are minuscule and cancel each other out. The Canadian reimportation rule will save consumers some money, but not much overall.

So that leaves the “favored nation” rule, which at least has the potential to drive down the cost of certain expensive drugs. Unfortunately, there’s no way of knowing what impact it will have until Trump issues an actual order instead of simply using it as a threat to hold over the heads of the pharma industry—which he’s been doing for the past couple of years with no results. Given the opposition of both pharma and most of the Republican Party, this is a pig in a poke until we see a final order.