Kyle Meng

America’s lowest-paid workers are suffering a sharper slowdown in wage growth than their richer peers, adding to the pressure on Donald Trump over inequality https://on.ft.com/3UbHZ3u

What to make of POTUS's attempt to fire the Commissioner of the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS)?

Let's run down what knowledgable people are saying...

Those are not “her” (BLS Commissioner’s) numbers. They’re constructed by career civil servants using data collected from thousands of businesses and government agencies.

Sea Level Mis-information from DOE Here in the USA, the Department of Energy (DOE) has issued a report titled “A Critical Review of the Impacts of Greenhouse Gas Emissions on the U.S. Climate.” It is a product of the &#8…

Is sea level around the US accelerating? If you actually do the analysis, instead of just repeating talking points from decades ago, the answer is yes.
tamino.wordpress.com/2025/08/03/s...

Trump Fired America’s Economic Data Collector. History Shows the Perils.

Trump Fired America’s Economic Data Collector. History Shows the Perils.
www.nytimes.com/2025/08/03/b...

Opinion | Columbia’s Administrators Are Fooling Themselves

Columbia’s Administrators Are Fooling Themselves www.nytimes.com/2025/07/23/o...

@mikegeruso.bsky.social and Dean Spears' book After the Spike is out!

One of the most thoughtful and thought-provoking books on population out there.

Our paper is officially out 🎉

We argue that climate clubs show promise:

- A climate club with coordinated penalties could curb 68% of excess emissions from free-riding

-Unilateral carbon tariffs? Not nearly as effective

The most binding changes to Medicaid won't occur until at least December of next year, after the midterms. Politics has a short memory, but we don't. 

Jared Bernstein and Elena Patel on the long-term impacts of the BBB.

Trump Threatens 50% Brazil Tariff, Citing Bolsonaro Trial That is the highest levy announced so far in Trump’s letters to world leaders this week, and comes after he wrote a lengthy message supporting the former Brazilian leader.

"Trump and his team have focused on reducing trade deficits in negotiations with many other nations, and his letter to Brazil references trade deficits as a national security threat, despite the fact that the U.S. runs a surplus with the country."

How California lawmakers can address sky-high electricity bills right now | Opinion “Lawmakers have options at their fingertips to provide immediate rate relief and address longer-term affordability without any new programs.”

My Sac Bee op-ed on how reauthorizing California's cap-and-trade program can help lower household electricity prices across the state.

#energysky #climatesky

A must read substack for anyone interested in CA gas prices.

Many have seen this "CA gas prices will hit $8/gal" study floating around.

Ryan Cummings, my Biden CEA colleague and one of the sharpest thinkers on oil markets, takes this study to task.

And it doesn't stand up well...

#energysky

I agree with all of Kyle’s critiques and would add 2 more:

1. The piece cites Australia and Canada as countries where voters rejected carbon prices, but that’s not true. In AUS it’s called a “safeguard mechanism” and was put in place in 2023. CAN kept the price for industries the focus of the piece

If you give out the carrot now, do we really think industry will come back later and ask for the stick?

The whole point of the carbon tariff is to make the stick of regulation more attractive.

You give that up and we've weakened incentives to adopt domestic climate regulation. /n

Finally, do we really think a carbon tariff now will make adoption of serious domestic climate policy more likely in the future?

Carbon tariffs are a carrot for industry. We normally think of that going together with the stick of domestic regulation as part of a single negotiation. 7/

Projected Effects of the Foreign Pollution Fee Act of 2025 Projected Effects of the Foreign Pollution Fee Act of 2025

Authors' cite a RFF study implying you can have your cake and eat it too. But the RFF study, which uses a GE model and so has trade effects, finds 5 year revenue of ~17B, not $198B! 6/

And isn't the point of carbon tariffs to lower demand for dirty foreign goods by importing less of it?

In other words, you can't have both high tariff revenue and high GHG reductions. Same with protection of domestic industries. Sides of the same coin. 5/

What about US govt revenue?

Authors' cite their calculation that FPFA raises $198B over 5 years.

But their accounting exercise makes a crucial assumption: trade volumes don't change under carbon tariffs.

FPFA increase tariffs on some goods by 100%!

Will imports really not fall? 4/

Look at iron/steel. This scatter from my upcoming paper plots country GHG intensities vs U.S. import penetration for iron/steel.

PRC imports serves <2% of U.S. consumption. And PRC consumes 94% of own iron/steel.

So trade too little for U.S. carbon tariffs to have much leverage. 3/

Let's start with PRC competition.

Yes, Chinese production is dirtier than the U.S.

But for a carbon tariffs to work, U.S. must be import dependent on dirty PRC imports. And the PRC must be export dependent.

That's not the case. 2/

Opinion | A carbon tariff is the right way to confront China on trade Climate-friendly tariffs would penalize countries that undercut U.S. companies with dirtier production.

This Op-Ed on a U.S. carbon tariff gets lots of basic stuff wrong.

Unlike authors' claims, a U.S. carbon tariff

1. Won't address PRC competition
2. Either raises lots of revenue or lowers GHGs (not both)
3. Weakens incentives to adopt domestic U.S. climate policy. 🧵 1/

#econsky #climatesky

The Devil is in the Details: Minerals, Batteries, and US Dependence on Chinese Imports - The Council on Strategic Risks The United States' growing dependence on China for critical minerals and battery supply chains poses a significant national security concern.

I hope some Senate aides read our new briefer on China battery and mineral supply chain dependencies before altering IRA rules on Section 30D or 45X. Losing local content incentives and overly restrictive FEOC rules would be a huge mistake. councilonstrategicrisks.org/2025/05/30/t...

The Senate Finance committee just dropped their draft text for the Republican budget bill. www.finance.senate.gov/chairmans-ne...
Like the House, it is hot trash and terrible for America. But it is marginally better for clean energy credits. Some key details... 🔌💡 🔌🚗

Trump’s Trade and Tax Policies Start to Stall U.S. Battery Boom

Batteries are a critical technology for the 21st century and one which the U.S. must be globally competitive in.

We are already several years behind the PRC in battery manufacturing. And will only fall further behind under current policy trajectory.

Our @voxeu.org article on our Cape Town Day Zero paper. When adaptation to climate change has equity consequences through how public utilities recover costs.

#EconSky #ClimateSky

I remember when the term “framework” was used to refer to an international agreement over not much. Now it’s “handshake for a framework.”

China’s Upper Hand: Rare Earth Metals

An excellent NYT Daily podcast about how 15 years of inconsistent start-stop U.S. industrial policy has kept us vulnerable on rare earths.

Clever California legislation back during Trump 1.

www.politico.com/story/2018/0...

💪💪💪