johnaallisonii.bsky.social - Profile | ThreadSky | a Reddit-style client for Bluesky

The only consistent & persistent voice. Then again, leaders are rare.

submitted 3 days ago • 0 comments

Snyder is right for this historical moment and also for the ongoing future because competent opposition makes the system stronger and healthier. But there’s one thing needed: a vision of purpose so that all the details the opposition cites is tied back to that vision of purpose.

submitted 14 days ago • 0 comments

Incredible piece of work: organizing chaotic reality at a critical point for in history.

submitted 15 days ago • 0 comments

Yes. Communication matters.

submitted 16 days ago • 0 comments

We’ve experienced unusually strong economic growth, including employment; steadily declining inflation; expansive corporate profits; & a powerful bull market since the fall of 2022. Understandably, it’s hard for investors and businesspeople to accept that Goldilocks is being defenestrated.

submitted 25 days ago • 0 comments

It’s important to see certain inescapable realities: US taxes cannot be extended let alone lowered w/o cutting govt spending; or the opposite: leave govt spending and raise taxes or some combo. Understood this way tariffs are the only acceptable tax for those unwilling to raise taxes another way.

submitted 25 days ago • 0 comments

No one can doubt that we are in a period of historical discontinuity – a clear separation of present from past. What history shows is that the objective outcomes of discontinuity are pretty quickly clear and stark - either clearly negative or positive, not in-between.

submitted 25 days ago • 1 comment

Isn’t it amazing that just when leaders with historical sense and conviction are most needed, the academic curriculum is deemphasizing the humanities & esp. history from the curriculum. So-called “soft” history is always the “hard’ truth needed when big, human actions & decisions are at stake.

submitted 26 days ago • 0 comments

You want to grow the economy? Have people produce more value in the same working day (increase productivity). Add people who produce more value (population growth). Any other money-making schemes may benefit those in the scheme but do nothing for economic growth.

submitted 26 days ago • 0 comments

What if the problem is irreconcilable differences not “divisions to be healed by finding areas of common ground”? Misdefining a problem leads to failure. For nations irreconcilable differences are resolved by the side with the vision of greatest value pursuing it with all its might & prevailing.

submitted 27 days ago • 1 comment

If the US govt could snap its fingers & force the Fed to lower rates who would benefit most, fastest? 1) The govt itself for which interest is the 4th largest expense after social security, health & defense; 2) Debtors who’ve borrowed against lower-quality assets eg private equity/credit players.

submitted 34 days ago • 0 comments

Dear Democratic orgs and politicians, enough is enough! I’m not sending you another $20. Especially if you’re not publicly talking about how to fix our problems as a party. Money won’t save us. Real talk—SPEAK OUT. We’ve been patient, but your silence is exhausting. No action, no donations!

submitted 35 days ago • 810 comments

Of the few levers in our complex economy, availability of the right labor for the right tasks is key. Immigration (legal) has been supplying ~2mm per year, set to drop to ½ mm. If so…consequences. open.substack.com/pub/adamtooz...

submitted 36 days ago • 0 comments

A well-known pundit, an economist by training, recently said more US-allied powers needed their own nuclear weapons to assure their safety. The fact that proliferating these weapons is even talked about as a safer option indicates the serious risks rising out of Pax Americana’s weakening.

submitted 37 days ago • 0 comments

My experience with even the most accomplished people with technical/technological minds is that social, political, cultural issues are “problems to solve” as if relationships & history of people who are the raw material of the problem are givens, rather than the core of what needs to be understood.

submitted 38 days ago • 0 comments

The US administration is now taking actions that affect people in and outside the country. Don’t assume we know what reactions to these actions will be. Inherent in the surprises of the period ahead are unforeseen secondary, tertiary responses. A reminder for investors & “regular” people.

submitted 38 days ago • 0 comments

In investing as in life it is easy to be caught up in the story and forget about the reality that may be quite different from the story. Also, stories tend to be “now” based. Reality tends to be “over time” based. This time span difference is another reason “the story” can be so captivating.

submitted 39 days ago • 0 comments

The biggest development in declining core CPI (now ~2.5% annually) is the downtrend in shelter inflation which represents 40% of core CPI. Last year it was at an annual run-rate of ~6-7%. Now it’s at 3-4% and given the “lagginess” to housing data, will likely be a persistent inflation positive.

submitted 39 days ago • 0 comments

Along with a starting gun coming for an incoming administration, the bell has been ringing on Q4 earnings, company outlooks for 2025 & future valuations. Chiming in are long-term rates which have been up since Sept 24. Harmony or dissonance between stocks & rates will be the tune to listen for.

submitted 39 days ago • 0 comments

As a new administration takes over the old watchword applies: “Don’t listen to what they say, watch what they do.” And so does the new watchword: “Listen to what they say, watch what they don’t do.”

submitted 39 days ago • 0 comments

Think! If the goal of tariffs is not to protect domestic industry (mostly in good competitive shape) but raise taxes to reduce the govt deficit - given that otherwise raising taxes domestically is a no-no -then unless foreign countries pay US taxes as a gift, how can tariffs not go up and stay up?

submitted 43 days ago • 0 comments

In companies I’ve observed close-up I can attest to the fact that the price paid for giving a talented individual lots of power who is seriously at odds with or harms the culture is not worth it. There’s a line between settling for mediocrity and risking corporate meltdown.

submitted 44 days ago • 0 comments

Mainstream Media at work: “B recently told a large, approving crowd 1+1=3. A and other experts insist 1+1=2.” I recall Charlie Munger: “It is remarkable how much long-term advantage people like us have gotten by trying to be consistently not stupid, instead of trying to be very intelligent.”

submitted 46 days ago • 0 comments

After decades of enduring traffic jams that often added an hour going a mile or two, generated huge frustration, wasted fuel, increased pollution, literally degraded productivity, New York City’s congestion pricing transformed a broken system into a healthy system. Systems can be radically improved.

submitted 48 days ago • 0 comments

The Media They Are A Changin’. Read Ted Gioia a) how media creation more indie b) people’s media interests shifting c) how legacy media must resort to M&A for salvation.https://www.honest-broker.com/p/get-rich-in-your-parents-basement?r=4h16p&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web&showWelcomeOnShare=false

submitted 49 days ago • 0 comments

I’m reading debates about why the US 10 year bond rate is up (29% since 9/16/24). Bonds worry only about solvency, liquidity and inflation.Solvency or liquidity for the US is a total non-worry. That leaves inflation. Bond (unlike equity) investors are almost never complicated people.

submitted 50 days ago • 0 comments

The most sensitive barometer of inflation is the Bond Market; the most sensitive barometer of growth is the Stock Market. Political pronouncements or actions can affect one, both or neither. That simple knowledge alone can tell you a lot.

submitted 51 days ago • 0 comments

The most sensitive barometer of inflation is the Bond Market; the most sensitive barometer of growth is the Stock Market. Political pronouncements or actions can affect one, both or neither. That simple knowledge alone can tell you a lot.

submitted 51 days ago • 0 comments

It is an investment oddity that just as inflation (incl. shelter) is down to the 2% channel, 10-year US bonds rise from ~3 ½% to ~4 ½% Sep to Jan while low-quality bubble stocks are up ~45% or more as though Mr. Bond and Mr. Equity are running fast down parallel roads in opposite directions.

submitted 52 days ago • 0 comments

Deep in the maw of bear markets stock buying by the knowing and intrepid is happening but is totally invisible. On the crests of bull market waves stock buying is not only visible but is accompanied by story upon story including rumor chased by the uncritical and greedy.

submitted 53 days ago • 0 comments

The UK is a good example of what happens when one side (Labour) trounces the opposition (Tories) because of the latter’s mistakes and ineffectiveness but tiptoes into the future with an agenda that seems to consist of breaking no eggs, making no omelettes – basically not boldly going forth.

submitted 53 days ago • 0 comments

One of the questions for the next few years regarding the inevitable deregulation that takes place is will it practically do more than just lower costs? Lower costs do not increase productive power (the bandwidth of what we can produce) & they’re only a slice of increased productivity.

submitted 55 days ago • 0 comments

Nov 9, 16 (post election day): the US10 yr was 2.07% - low b/c the Fed was still in “rescue the system & avoid deflation” mode post 2007-09. Nov 4, 20 (post election day): it was 0.77% - lower b/c of added COVID economic collapse rescuing. Today: robust economy + Fed in “prevent inflation” mode.

submitted 56 days ago • 0 comments

As an investor I am amazed that tariffs are not more clearly seen as the buggy whips of economic policy & tax collecting. As the stealth tolls they are, they will raise less tax than believed; inflate costs; pressure consumer budgets; & lower domestic & worldwide growth.

submitted 56 days ago • 0 comments

In the past quarter we’ve seen in the equity markets a narrow surge of speculative stocks of various kinds – eg those expected to be favored by the new administration. Speculation is always fueled by crowd thinking and is most intense when there is the least amount of reality to measure it against.

submitted 59 days ago • 0 comments

The positive value of democracy, like the key to your front door, is the options it gives - to let (vote) in whom you prefer & send out whom you don’t. Its options are your freedom. The negative value of autocracy is that the key, options, freedom & front door are the autocrat’s. You’re locked in.

submitted 61 days ago • 0 comments

The positive future for Ukraine and Europe on the level of increased political & military strength, increased economic production power, and the strengthening of values & culture that unify vs.the dead hand of Russia on both, is why Ukraine prevailing is a historical must not an option.

submitted 62 days ago • 0 comments

This is how reputations & trust get trashed. Part of the collateral damage of rule- and truth-flouting.

submitted 62 days ago • 0 comments

Professional Investors assume that domestic power structures of the world’s major nations remain relatively unchanged while economies operate on top of them. The question ahead - in the US & even Europe - is will power structures change so much that they’ll uncharacteristically impact economies.

submitted 63 days ago • 0 comments

There are a small group of stocks rising rapidly because the underlying companies are expected to be significantly favored by the new administration. if, concurrently policies are being readied (eg tariffs) disfavoring the rest, how does the divergence play out? Question to explore.

submitted 64 days ago • 0 comments

China still a world economy problem in 2025. It’s shifted investment from real estate to manufacturing seeking export mkts that can’t/won’t absorb its tsunami of product. Insightful Stetser strategy stocking stuffer: x.com/brad_setser/...

submitted 65 days ago • 0 comments

If you assume A) you don’t want to raise marginal tax rates in the US for individuals and corporations & B) you need to raise taxes somehow even w/ spending cuts, you are left with only 2 main existing choices A) various user taxes & B) tariffs. All policy outcomes, bad or good, flow from a logic.

submitted 67 days ago • 0 comments

The unappreciated power & danger of social vs legacy media is that I may view on the same platform what millions of others are not viewing. I may be viewing “1+1=2” & millions “1=1=5.” And I don’t even know it. Same as the NY Times producing 1 front page for me & an opposite front page for others.

submitted 67 days ago • 0 comments

People say: we’re a nation & world culturally divided. They have explanations for how we got here. History shows the only way out of cultural fragmentation is a new culture based on deeper understandings than those once unifying the old but incorporating the most value-generating pieces of the old.

submitted 67 days ago • 0 comments

Reality v Headlines: US Healthcare has reached a ceiling of ~17 ½% of GDP over the past few years. All healthcare providers know the ceiling is not going higher. Growth & pricing power lies only with innovation (devices, processes, drugs, biologics etc). Non-innovation is flatlining/declining.

submitted 69 days ago • 0 comments

We all know things are more costly - a cup of coffee, a house, a new hire, a plane trip - but the arc of inflation continues to bend lower (as today’s YoY 2.8% core PCE result shows). What we experience as higher inflation is really the embedded COVID/post-COVID pop, not today’s increments of price.

submitted 70 days ago • 0 comments

Yesterday (Dec 18) marked the starting gun going off on economic and political realities replacing the unbridled optimism in the air – from the Fed’s prudential 2025 stance to surfacing of internal pressures within the House majority around spending cuts

submitted 71 days ago • 0 comments

The media are changing. Right under our noses. Focus on AI, yes. But something as big as AI – how we learn, enjoy, know – is coming through completely novel channels. Read the brilliant Ted Gioia. open.substack.com/pub/tedgioia...

submitted 72 days ago • 0 comments