Latest / Trend Watch / Episode 105: Mail Ballots, the NH Primary, and Falling Test Scores

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Episode 105: Mail Ballots, the NH Primary, and Falling Test Scores · Trend Watch

• 0:04
  SPEAKER_01: Ready to take a deeper look at where history, politics, and economics all intersect?
• 0:10
  SPEAKER_01: Well then, you've come to the right place.
• 0:13
  SPEAKER_01: Each week,
• 0:14
  SPEAKER_01: here's where we pull back the headlines and focus on the big trends,
• 0:18
  SPEAKER_01: the stuff that actually shapes our future.
• 0:21
  SPEAKER_01: Through the noise, we focus on the signal.
• 0:24
  SPEAKER_01: I'm your host, Neil Howe, and this is Trend Watch.
• 0:30
  SPEAKER_01: Today is September 10th, 2026, and this is Trend Watch.
• 0:35
  SPEAKER_01: Welcome back, everybody.
• 0:37
  SPEAKER_01: As usual, I have on my fellow analyst, Christian Ford.
• 0:40
  SPEAKER_01: So, Christian, what happened this last week for you?
• 0:45
  SPEAKER_00: Well, Neil, I got to tell you, it was a week of highs and lows on the low end.
• 0:50
  SPEAKER_00: I woke up Friday morning to find a tree on top of my car, but on the high end, I got my puppy.
• 0:56
  SPEAKER_01: That's right.
• 0:57
  SPEAKER_01: I remember you telling me about that, you know?
• 1:02
  SPEAKER_01: This is very millennial activity.
• 1:05
  SPEAKER_01: Can't have a child, get a dog, you know?
• 1:08
  SPEAKER_01: That's right.
• 1:09
  SPEAKER_01: Get a pet.
• 1:09
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 1:11
  SPEAKER_01: And so I understand it.
• 1:13
  SPEAKER_01: Look, I mean,
• 1:14
  SPEAKER_01: in our area,
• 1:14
  SPEAKER_01: we've had huge thunderstorms and I'm sure that that's what took the trees down in
• 1:19
  SPEAKER_01: the D.C. area, right?
• 1:20
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, yeah.
• 1:21
  SPEAKER_00: It was a huge storm.
• 1:22
  SPEAKER_00: I think, you know, I live on a little half block and about four trees went down.
• 1:26
  SPEAKER_00: There was trees down all over the city.
• 1:28
  SPEAKER_01: Well, you're lucky to have trees at all in D.C. Yeah.
• 1:33
  SPEAKER_01: In your area of D.C. Yeah.
• 1:36
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 1:38
  SPEAKER_01: Well, look, why don't we just move into it?
• 1:41
  SPEAKER_01: We've got a lot to talk about and a lot has been happening in the markets too.
• 1:47
  SPEAKER_01: So why don't we just launch into it here?
• 1:51
  SPEAKER_01: Tell us what happened today in this last week and we can,
• 1:55
  SPEAKER_01: you know, particularly today was very interesting.
• 1:57
  SPEAKER_01: We'll talk about it in a minute with interest rates and energy, but go ahead.
• 2:01
  SPEAKER_00: Was not a great day for markets.
• 2:03
  SPEAKER_00: The S&P 500 closed down 0.58%.
• 2:07
  SPEAKER_00: And over the last five trading days is down 2.01%.
• 2:11
  SPEAKER_00: As for the global Dow, that closed down today 0.77%.
• 2:14
  SPEAKER_00: And over the last five days.
• 2:16
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, and who's buying the dip?
• 2:18
  SPEAKER_00: You know, one thing that's interesting is just the steady sinking of the S&P 500.
• 2:45
  SPEAKER_01: And not a lot of,
• 2:46
  SPEAKER_01: you know,
• 2:47
  SPEAKER_01: not really turning,
• 2:49
  SPEAKER_01: you know, parabolic in a negative direction, but not really rallying either, right?
• 2:56
  SPEAKER_01: I don't know if that's the generally still low volume of trading activity
• 3:00
  SPEAKER_01: that we've been having.
• 3:03
  SPEAKER_01: Typically,
• 3:04
  SPEAKER_01: over this past several days,
• 3:07
  SPEAKER_01: the chip stocks were up and everything else was kind of down more.
• 3:10
  SPEAKER_01: You know, those stocks would be up, you know, maybe 1%.
• 3:15
  SPEAKER_01: And everything else would be down 1%, you know, something like that.
• 3:19
  SPEAKER_01: But today, everything was sort of down, right?
• 3:24
  SPEAKER_01: Except for energy.
• 3:27
  SPEAKER_01: And, you know, outside equities, obviously, except for commodities, right?
• 3:34
  SPEAKER_01: So what about economic reports?
• 3:36
  SPEAKER_01: Anything come out last week?
• 3:38
  SPEAKER_01: I know we had the NFP employment report, right?
• 3:44
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 3:48
  SPEAKER_00: Came in quite strong at 162,000, way ahead of expectations of 56K.
• 3:51
  SPEAKER_00: Also, the July number was revised upward from a 23,000 loss to a 21,000 gain.
• 3:55
  SPEAKER_00: And the June number was also revised.
• 4:04
  SPEAKER_00: We also got a little bit of inflation data today.
• 4:10
  SPEAKER_00: We had the PPI, which rose from 4.8% year over year to 5.4% year over year.
• 4:17
  SPEAKER_00: That was higher than expected.
• 4:19
  SPEAKER_00: And as for core PPI, that rose from 4.3% year over year to 4.6%.
• 4:25
  SPEAKER_01: You know,
• 4:25
  SPEAKER_01: if you look at all this data together,
• 4:27
  SPEAKER_01: an economy running a little bit hotter than everyone thought.
• 4:32
  SPEAKER_01: The PPI coming in a little higher than anyone thought, certainly still way above target, right?
• 4:42
  SPEAKER_01: Even looking at core.
• 4:45
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 4:45
  SPEAKER_01: Whatever core means for the PPI, it's kind of a strange concept there.
• 4:48
  SPEAKER_01: But
• 4:52
  SPEAKER_01: plus
• 4:56
  SPEAKER_01: the oil price movement, we haven't talked about that.
• 4:59
  SPEAKER_01: We'll get to that in a second because a lot of that had to do with what's happening
• 5:02
  SPEAKER_01: in the Middle East.
• 5:03
  SPEAKER_01: But the Brent price for oil not only went above $100 a barrel for the first time
• 5:12
  SPEAKER_01: in months, it ended the day at $108.
• 5:14
  SPEAKER_01: It's now at $109.
• 5:16
  SPEAKER_01: I think that was probably post-market trading.
• 5:21
  SPEAKER_01: This is near the high point of the war, right?
• 5:23
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, this is near the highest it's ever gotten.
• 5:29
  SPEAKER_01: And we're going to talk a little bit later about what's driving that.
• 5:33
  SPEAKER_01: Just to preview,
• 5:34
  SPEAKER_01: I think it's because people realize where the war is now,
• 5:38
  SPEAKER_01: it shows no signs of changing, not only before the midterm, but just indefinitely.
• 5:43
  SPEAKER_01: The latest scuttlebutt has to do with,
• 5:45
  SPEAKER_01: you know, is Trump going to be in this war until the end of his presidency, right?
• 5:50
  SPEAKER_01: Because, and when we talk about Iran, we'll get to that.
• 5:53
  SPEAKER_01: Neither side shows any,
• 5:55
  SPEAKER_01: you know,
• 5:56
  SPEAKER_01: both sides are threatening the To ramp up even higher if the other side strikes,
• 6:01
  SPEAKER_01: right?
• 6:02
  SPEAKER_01: That's not a good sign for tension going down.
• 6:07
  SPEAKER_01: Plus the fact that people are suddenly becoming aware.
• 6:10
  SPEAKER_01: We've talked about that for a long time.
• 6:13
  SPEAKER_01: Reserves are really running out.
• 6:15
  SPEAKER_01: I think people are beginning to see that there's nothing there,
• 6:17
  SPEAKER_01: you know, in those tanks anymore, right?
• 6:20
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 6:21
  SPEAKER_01: So we're going to obviously follow this very carefully.
• 6:25
  SPEAKER_01: So this is one thing.
• 6:27
  SPEAKER_01: So think about this.
• 6:28
  SPEAKER_01: The economy running hot,
• 6:31
  SPEAKER_01: oil suddenly skyrocketing,
• 6:33
  SPEAKER_01: and that suggests a sort of a supply jolt stop to the economy.
• 6:42
  SPEAKER_01: But there's one more thing, and again, I think we will mention that a little bit.
• 6:51
  SPEAKER_01: GOP convention and Trump getting up and promising $5,000 to every adult citizen if
• 7:00
  SPEAKER_01: the Republican Party wins.
• 7:04
  SPEAKER_01: Now, I couldn't believe this.
• 7:06
  SPEAKER_01: We are really in banana republic territory.
• 7:09
  SPEAKER_01: You know what I mean?
• 7:10
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, this to me, well, yeah, I just did the quick calculation.
• 7:15
  SPEAKER_01: 240 million adult citizens are Times $5,000, that's $1.2 trillion.
• 7:23
  SPEAKER_01: But who's counting, right?
• 7:25
  SPEAKER_01: That'll drive up publicly held debt to another four percentage points of GDP.
• 7:31
  SPEAKER_01: Sort of just keep pushing that up.
• 7:35
  SPEAKER_01: It'll all be paid for for our kids, right?
• 7:38
  SPEAKER_01: But you know, who's thinking about the kids?
• 7:41
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, I come back to you.
• 7:44
  SPEAKER_01: You're not.
• 7:45
  SPEAKER_01: You're having a puppy, not kids.
• 7:48
  SPEAKER_01: I don't know.
• 7:48
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, my dog isn't paying.
• 7:49
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, exactly.
• 7:53
  SPEAKER_01: We may have to have special levies on millennial pets.
• 7:57
  SPEAKER_01: I'm sorry,
• 7:57
  SPEAKER_01: but I think we're going to strap your pet into some wheat mill
• 8:02
  SPEAKER_01: and just have your pet.
• 8:04
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, gosh.
• 8:05
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 8:14
  SPEAKER_01: Well, if you don't want that to happen,
• 8:18
  SPEAKER_01: Christian, you're just going to have to have some children paying FICA.
• 8:22
  SPEAKER_01: I'm sorry.
• 8:22
  SPEAKER_01: There's just no other way out of it.
• 8:25
  SPEAKER_01: I was amused.
• 8:27
  SPEAKER_01: By the way,
• 8:28
  SPEAKER_01: all of this,
• 8:29
  SPEAKER_01: and I should say,
• 8:31
  SPEAKER_01: when we talk about yields going up today, it wasn't just the long-term yield.
• 8:36
  SPEAKER_01: It was the entire yield curve from short to long.
• 8:41
  SPEAKER_01: And If you want to look at the expectations of a
• 8:48
  SPEAKER_01: federal fund's hike,
• 8:50
  SPEAKER_01: are they going to hike at the next meeting?
• 8:52
  SPEAKER_01: That is to say,
• 8:54
  SPEAKER_01: the ones coming before the midterms,
• 8:57
  SPEAKER_01: the expectation is now 72%, a hike of 25 basis points and 28% no change.
• 9:04
  SPEAKER_01: You remember, it was actually slightly the other way.
• 9:06
  SPEAKER_01: It was more like 50-50 last week when we talked about it.
• 9:10
  SPEAKER_01: I think everyone's just putting all this together and saying, you know what?
• 9:14
  SPEAKER_01: And certainly the markets are anticipating that.
• 9:16
  SPEAKER_01: That's why the two-year went up.
• 9:18
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, as I said, the entire yield curve hiked.
• 9:24
  SPEAKER_01: But interesting,
• 9:25
  SPEAKER_01: Christopher Waller,
• 9:26
  SPEAKER_01: who's Trump's appointment to the Fed board, he had an interesting quote.
• 9:33
  SPEAKER_01: I just have to repeat this.
• 9:36
  SPEAKER_01: He said, Because now he's sort of saying, well, maybe we don't need to hike.
• 9:40
  SPEAKER_01: You know, I'm sure that Donald Trump talked to him.
• 9:45
  SPEAKER_01: And he said, what's the cost of waiting one meeting?
• 9:49
  SPEAKER_01: Hiking 25 basis points one meeting right now is not going to bring the CPI down to 2%.
• 9:57
  SPEAKER_01: I had to laugh out loud.
• 9:58
  SPEAKER_01: And now it's just two.
• 10:00
  SPEAKER_01: We're way beyond that.
• 10:01
  SPEAKER_01: You know, I mean, what's...
• 10:04
  SPEAKER_01: What's 25 basis points going to do?
• 10:07
  SPEAKER_01: We're in it much too deep for that.
• 10:09
  SPEAKER_01: Let's just give it up for a while.
• 10:11
  SPEAKER_01: It's kind of like when you're running a deficit,
• 10:15
  SPEAKER_01: you're running a small deficit, you might worry about it.
• 10:18
  SPEAKER_01: But once it's 6% of GDP for five years in a row,
• 10:23
  SPEAKER_01: you just sort of say, we can't possibly do anything about that.
• 10:27
  SPEAKER_01: Let's just let it run.
• 10:29
  SPEAKER_01: Whoa.
• 10:30
  SPEAKER_01: Whoa.
• 10:31
  SPEAKER_01: Well, that doesn't sound so good, does it?
• 10:33
  SPEAKER_01: We've got a bunch of stuff coming up.
• 10:35
  SPEAKER_01: I think we're going to talk briefly about the Supreme Court.
• 10:38
  SPEAKER_01: We're going to talk about in the midterms.
• 10:40
  SPEAKER_01: Just to give people an idea of what's coming up,
• 10:42
  SPEAKER_01: we're going to talk about the PISA achievement scores.
• 10:45
  SPEAKER_01: You know, what's happening to K-12 school achievement.
• 10:50
  SPEAKER_01: PISA is the big international exam that is given, and it kind of had stunning results.
• 10:58
  SPEAKER_01: We're going to talk about Germany.
• 11:01
  SPEAKER_01: A little bit about the Iran War and what's happening abroad.