MoneyPalooza Monstrosity: It Passed! More on the Multiemployer Pension Bailout

Mary Pat Campbell

Link: https://marypatcampbell.substack.com/p/moneypalooza-monstrosity-it-passed

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Excerpt:

Here are the whole-number ratios if you can’t eyeball the relationships above.

The total MEP unfunded liability is 8 times that of the bailout bill amount

The total public pension unfunded liability is 22 times that of the bailout bill amount (this happens to be the same as the total American Rescue Plan Act of 2021)

The total Social Security shortfall is almost 200 times that of the MEP bailout bill

Author(s): Mary Pat Campbell

Publication Date: 8 March 2021

Publication Site: STUMP on Substack

COVID dollars: Stimulus, relief or bailout? A closer look at some math

Mary Pat Campbell

Link: https://www.truthinaccounting.org/news/detail/covid-dollars-stimulus-relief-or-bailout-a-closer-look-at-some-math

Excerpt:

Illinois and Connecticut state governments don’t pay taxes to the federal government. In Illinois’ latest financial report, a report prepared by the department led by Mendoza (note that the latest report available is for fiscal 2019, for a fiscal year that ended more than 600 days ago), Illinois reported roughly $25 billion in grant “revenue,” most of it from the federal government. This doesn’t add up to Illinois contributing more in federal taxes than it receives from the federal government.

So how does their math work?

To claim that Illinois and Connecticut act as donor states, Mendoza and Lembo are “counting” on the money sent by their state’s taxpayers to the federal government, a very large amount.

But when they call for federal “relief,” they aren’t calling for federal money for state taxpayers. They are calling for federal “relief” to be sent to state governments.

Author(s): Bill Bergman

Publication Date: 8 March 2021

Publication Site: Truth in Accounting

Cuomo’s Office Covered Up Nursing Home Death Toll Last Summer

Mary Pat Campbell
Cuomo’s Office Covered Up Nursing Home Death Toll Last Summer

Excerpt:

Cuomo aides kept nursing home death numbers quiet. A damning new report from The New York Times suggests Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s office knew as early as last June how deadly the governor’s plans were proving for nursing home residents, but still concealed this information from the public.

Early in the pandemic, Cuomo had ordered that nursing homes could not reject patients from returning to those facilities after testing positive for COVID-19 and being hospitalized. He also barred the deaths of COVID-19 patients transferred from nursing homes to hospitals after catching the virus from being counted among nursing home COVID-19 deaths.

Author(s): ELIZABETH NOLAN BROWN

Publication Date: 5 March 2021

Publication Site: Reason

Detroit Mayor Is Wrong To Turn Down J&J COVID-19 Vaccines

Mary Pat Campbell
Detroit Mayor Is Wrong To Turn Down J&J COVID-19 Vaccines

Excerpt:

The Detroit Free Press reports that the mayor declined to accept a shipment of 6,200 doses of the Johnson & Johnson one-shot vaccine. Why? At a press conference on Tuesday, the mayor asserted, “Johnson & Johnson is a very good vaccine. Moderna and Pfizer are the best. And I am going to do everything I can to make sure the residents of the city of Detroit get the best.”

What does the mayor mean by “best”? Duggan stated, “The Moderna and Pfizer vaccines are 95% effective if you get two shots. Johnson & Johnson is one shot, which is nicer, but it’s about 67% effective.”

Actually, in the United States arm of the Johnson & Johnson (J&J) clinical trial, the vaccine’s ability to prevent moderate to severe infection was 72 percent and it is 85 percent effective at preventing severe disease.In addition, the J&J vaccine has been shown to be effective against the new, more contagious COVID-19 variants that are now spreading across the country. And it is likely that many citizens would prefer the convenience of getting a one-and-done J&J shot as opposed to waiting nearly a month to get a second Moderna or Pfizer/BioNTech shot.

Author(s): Ronald Bailey

Publication Date: 5 March 2021

Publication Site: Reason

COVID-19: CDC Unveils Highly-Anticipated Guidelines For Those Who Are Fully Vaccinated

Mary Pat Campbell

Link: https://dailyvoice.com/new-york/northsalem/news/covid-19-cdc-unveils-highly-anticipated-guidelines-for-those-who-are-fully-vaccinated/804610/

Excerpt:

Those fully vaccinated can:

Visit indoors with unvaccinated people from one other household without masks or physical distancing, if the unvaccinated people are at low risk for severe disease.

Visit others who are vaccinated indoors without masks or physical distancing

Skip testing and quarantine if exposed to someone who has COVID but is asymptomatic, but should monitor for symptoms for 14 days

Author(s): Joe Lombardi

Publication Date: 8 March 2021

Publication Site: Daily Voice

The end of LIBOR to be anything but simple

Mary Pat Campbell

Link: https://www.pionline.com/investing/end-libor-be-anything-simple

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LIBOR, which has been plagued by cases of bank manipulation, is set at different currencies, including the U.S. dollar, British pound sterling and euro. New LIBOR-based contracts will cease at the end of 2021, but in November, the Intercontinental Exchange Inc. announced that the ICE Benchmark Administration, which administers LIBOR, would explore ceasing the most utilized U.S. dollar LIBOR tenors in June 2023 instead of late 2021. On March 5, Britain’s Financial Conduct Authority confirmed the 2021 and 2023 cessation dates for LIBOR, although it retains the option for a synthetic calculation if needed.

The extension to June 2023 would allow more time for outstanding contracts to mature, thereby reducing the chance of potential disruptions, U.S. regulators said in a December statement.

But the majority of contracts extend beyond mid-2023.

Author(s): Brian Croce

Publication Date: 8 March 2021

Publication Site: Pensions & Investments

Libor Enters ‘Final Chapter’ as Global Regulators Set End Dates

Mary Pat Campbell

Link: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-03-05/libor-s-end-now-within-sight-as-u-k-s-fca-sets-final-dates

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Regulators kicked off the final countdown for the London interbank offered rate Friday, ordering banks to be ready for the end of a much maligned benchmark that’s been at the heart of the international financial system for decades.

The U.K. Financial Conduct Authority confirmed that the final fixings for most rates will take place at end of this year, with just a few key dollar tenors set to linger for a further 18 months.

Author(s): William Shaw, Silla Brush, Alex Harris

Publication Date: 5 March 2021

Publication Site: Bloomberg

To Advance Racial Equity, Releasing Disaggregated Data while Protecting Privacy Will Be Key

Mary Pat Campbell

Link: https://www.urban.org/urban-wire/advance-racial-equity-releasing-disaggregated-data-while-protecting-privacy-will-be-key

Excerpt:

Although the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention declared COVID-19 hits communities of color the hardest—and extensive evidence backs this up—communities of color are not receiving the aid they need. Health officials say the lack of disaggregated data by race and ethnicity has affected timely vaccine distribution and proper messaging for correcting misinformation to help those communities.

This situation highlights one of many challenges President Biden’s day-one executive order on racial equity aims to resolve. If federal policymakers want to address racial disparities, they should collect and release detailed, disaggregated data. But they must also carefully consider the unintended harms they could cause to the people they are trying to help.

There has been a longstanding debate over protecting personal data versus supporting the common good. In particular, people of color with low incomes are more susceptible to privacy attacks because of their higher reliance on smartphones for internet access and how much personal information they give up for free cell phone app services. This information collection makes them more easily identifiable, especially if they are outliers in small geographies.

Author(s): Claire Bowen, Aaron R. Williams, Ajjit Narayanan

Publication Date: 2 March 2021

Publication Site: Urban Institute

Three Things You Can do to Make Your Data Tables More Visual

Mary Pat Campbell

Link: https://policyviz.com/2021/03/02/three-things-you-can-do-to-make-your-data-tables-more-visual/

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One last option is to add sparklines. Sparklines are small line charts that are typically used in data-rich tables, often at the end of a row or column. The purpose of sparklines is not necessarily to help the reader find specific values but instead to show general patterns and trends. Here, the sparklines show all five years of data, which allows us to omit three columns of numbers, lightening and simplifying the table. This approach lets us show the full time series in the sparklines while just showing the two endpoints in the table cells.

Author(s): Jon Schwabish

Publication Date: 2 March 2021

Publication Site: PolicyViz

Style Guides

Mary Pat Campbell

Link: https://policyviz.com/2016/11/30/style-guides/

Excerpt:

In the previous iteration of this site, I reserved a special page dedicated to collecting Data Visualization Style Guides. I’m republishing that collection here as a blog post with the rekindled hope that readers will add their own or their organization’s guides to the collection.

The original idea was developed at the Responsible Data Forum in New York City on January 11, 2016. It’s simply a list of data visualization style guides provided in no particular order. The idea is to build a collection of guides that layout style, formatting, and perhaps some other basic recommendations. These should not necessarily be documents that describe “best practices” or “dos and don’ts”.

My hope is that this post will serve as a repository for guides from around the world that others can use to develop their own guides and best practices. The list was originally published in January 2016, started small, and has grown to more than 15 documents. But I’m sure there is more, so please send me your suggestions and links using the comment box below, via the Contact form, or on Twitter.

Author(s): Jon Schwabish

Date Accessed: 8 March 2021

Publication Site: PolicyViz

Greensill Capital Tumbles Into Insolvency, Spreading Financial Pain

Mary Pat Campbell

Link: https://www.wsj.com/articles/greensill-capital-tumbles-into-insolvency-spreading-financial-pain-11615216346

Excerpt:

Greensill Capital filed for insolvency protection Monday, days after regulators took over its banking unit and Credit Suisse Group AG froze investment funds that were critical to the startup’s operations.

The unwinding has rippled to holders of the Credit Suisse funds, German municipalities that deposited money with Greensill’s bank, and a high-profile duo of venture-capital investors.

Greensill specialized in supply-chain finance, a type of short-term cash advance to companies to stretch out the time they have to pay their bills. The firm was once worth $4 billion based on investments from SoftBank Group Corp.’s Vision Fund. The collapse marks a high-profile blow for the mammoth Japanese investor.

Author(s): Julie Steinberg, Duncan Mavin, Patricia Kowsmann

Publication Date: 8 March 2021

Publication Site: Wall Street Journal

Pandemic Impact on Mortality and Economy Varies Across Age Groups and Geographies

Mary Pat Campbell

Link: https://www.census.gov/library/stories/2021/03/initial-impact-covid-19-on-united-states-economy-more-widespread-than-on-mortality.html?utm_campaign=20210308msacos1ccstors&utm_medium=email&utm_source=govdelivery

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As with geography, job loss was more widespread than excess mortality across age groups.

In April 2020, excess mortality increased with age and was largest among the oldest age group. Individuals ages 85 and older represent only 3% of the total U.S. population ages 25 years and older but accounted for 34% of the overall excess mortality in the country.

On the other hand, employment displacement decreased with age. It was largest among the younger age group (ages 25 to 44). These individuals make up only 39% of the U.S. population ages 25 and older but accounted for about half of the people 25 and older who lost their jobs nationwide.

Author(s): VICTORIA UDALOVA

Publication Date: 8 March 2021

Publication Site: U.S. Census Bureau