THE FLAG
Posts
🇺🇸 Su-Per Pick?

🇺🇸 Su-Per Pick?

Plus, a purse-snatching toddler...

May 02, 2023

POWERED BY

Good morning, and happy Tuesday! Check out this father’s letter to his kid. He outlines the 9 money and life lessons most people learn too late in life...

Plus, a purse-snatching toddler...

Also, looking to diversify your portfolio? Many people don't think about this asset, but it's worth taking a look...

FLAG POLLS

📉 Monday, May 1, President Biden Job Approval: Approve 47, Disapprove 51 (Rasmussen Reports)

📉 Monday, May 1, Direction of Country: Right Track 39, Wrong Track 56 (Rasmussen Reports)

📈 Friday, April 28, President Biden Job Approval: Approve 50, Disapprove 49 (Rasmussen Reports)

🐎 Thursday, April 27, Democratic Presidential Nomination 2024: Biden 70, Kennedy 21, Williamson 8 (Emerson)

POWERED BY MASTERWORKS

Investors earn a 325% annualized return here? (See how they did it)

The world’s richest investors have been using this under the radar asset to preserve their wealth for centuries. Now, thanks to Masterworks, everyday investors are using it to collect double and even triple digit annualized returns.

I’m talking about contemporary art, and if you’re looking for an asset class that’s already delivering solid returns without the day to day volatility of the stock market…

You should go check out Masterworks.com.

Because their latest exit was a sculpture that handed investors a 15.4% net return in just 36 days, that’s a 325% return on an annualized basis.

And while it’s not common for Masterworks to get such a profitable exit that fast, every one of Masterworks’ 13 exits has returned a profit to investors, with the last few works delivering 10.4%, 13.9% and 35%.

If you want the chance to join them, you can use this link to sign up for a free, no obligation membership here.

See important disclosures: masterworks.com/cd

QUICK CLICKS

Dust Storm Turns Deadly, Rocket Storage Shockwave, AI Godfather Quitting Google

US: Dust storm in Illinois leaves at least 6 dead after dozens of vehicles crash on major highway, officials say (CNN)

US: US Military Releases New Details About Balloon That Flew Over Hawaii (Daily Wire)

Economy: US may default on June 1 without debt ceiling hike; Biden, McCarthy to meet (Reuters)

World: Russia-Ukraine war at a glance: what we know on day 433 of the invasion (The Guardian) + Massive Shockwave From Russian Strike May Have Been A Rocket Storage Facility Detonating (The War Zone)

World: May Day demonstrators clashed with police in France as workers protest Macron's bill increasing retirement age (NBC News)

Sports: Texas college baseball player struck by stray bullet in bullpen during game (NY Post)

Tech: AI 'godfather' Geoffrey Hinton warns of dangers as he quits Google (BBC)

POLITICS

Su-Per Pick?

Last week, President Biden's pick to run the Labor Department, Julie Su, had her candidacy advanced through the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions (HELP) Committee. Now, her final confirmation hinges on a full Senate floor vote. It's not clear if she has the votes to pass.

Reporting from The Right: Biden's Labor nominee Julie Su advances out of committee in party-line vote Chris Pandolfo, Fox News

Reporting from The Left: Julie Su: Biden's pick for labor secretary is a civil rights lawyer and the department's acting chief Maegan Vazquez, CNN

From The Flag: The committee voted 11-10 along party lines to advance Su's candidacy. She previously ran California's labor department and spend the past two years as deputy Labor secretary. Here's the latest from both sides.

LEFT-LEANING SENTIMENT

Big Business Is Opposed To Su as Secretary

During her time as California's labor secretary, Su backed legislation that many powerful business interests don't want to see happen on the national level.
Republican Senators like Mitt Romney complain about Su's history of working closely with unions, but shouldn't the secretary be expected to advocate for labor?
Powerful corporate interests have led the campaign against Su's candidacy because she has been a powerful ally of US workers.

Biden’s Excellent Labor Department Nominee Might Get Sunk—by Democrats ‍Timothy Noah, New Republic: "A central paradox of contemporary politics is that class resentment is its lingua franca yet policies to help working people are a hard sell. Republicans oppose these policies. Democrats favor them, but inconsistently. The latest iteration of this maddening reality is the imperiled nomination of Julie Su for labor secretary. ... Su is a superb nominee... (but) has two vulnerabilities... The first is that at the start of the Covid epidemic, California’s Employment Development Department... stopped reviewing eligibility for most (unemployment) claims. That resulted in the payout of an estimated $20 billion to people who weren’t eligible, many of them identity thieves. ... Su’s second vulnerability concerns her championing California’s Assembly Bill 5, a tough 2019 law that cracked down on the misclassification of employees as independent contractors. ... The national business community is fervently opposed... because it wants to maintain its current unconscionable latitude in deciding whether any given worker will receive minimum wage, Social Security, and other protections."

Mitt Romney Thinks the Labor Secretary Shouldn't Represent Labor ‍Jonathan Chait, NY Magazine: "One of the most distinctive and important features of the American political economy is the power differential between business and labor. Not only is the former vastly larger and wealthier, it also commands respect and attention from the political system that the latter could never dream of. A small window into the differential can be seen in comments made by Mitt Romney the other day at the hearings for Julie Su... (He) complained that Su has met frequently with unions, but only recently with business. This means, he complained, she is not 'an unbiased, neutral arbiter' ... (But) the Commerce secretary is understood as a representative of business. The Treasury secretary is supposed to have at least the respect of Wall Street. ... So should all Cabinet secretaries be neutral between business and labor, or just the Labor secretary?"

One more opinion piece from the Left: Sanders Blasts Corporations 'Spending Millions' to Defeat Worker Champion Julie Su ‍Jake Johnson, Common Dreams

RIGHT-LEANING SENTIMENT

Su As Secretary? Good For Unions, Bad for Workers and Families

Even though it caused chaos for the California job market and voters reacted by exempting workers, Su wants to enforce a divisive measure at the national level.
By implementing legislation that more or less prohibits part-time work, families are harmed, because of how parents tend to handle child care duties.
While news reports focus on Su being the potential first-ever Asian labor secretary, her performance while on the job in California was a disaster.

A Big Labor Partisan Named Julie Su ‍Editorial Board, Wall Street Journal: "Currently the deputy secretary, Ms. Su has a record of putting union interests above those of individual workers or flexible business models that workers like but unions oppose. As labor secretary in California, she drove implementation of the state’s AB5 law, which reclassified independent contractors as employees. The law was aimed at Uber drivers and other gig workers, but it ended up smacking workers seeking flexible hours in multiple industries—comedy performers, personal fitness trainers, midwives, transcriptionists, hairdressers, music-lesson providers. After the law passed, Ms. Su promised statewide investigations and audits to enforce compliance. The ensuing labor and economic harm caused the state to exempt numerous professions from the law, while voters in 2020 overwhelming passed an initiative exempting many gig workers from the statute. Ms. Su’s Labor department is nonetheless taking AB5 national with a proposed regulation that replicates California’s mess by reclassifying millions of contractors as employees."

Biden nominee’s war on contract work is really a war on parents ‍Timothy P. Carney, Washington Examiner: "What families generally want is for one or both parents to be able to cut back on work to care for their young children. Half of American mothers said their preferred child care arrangement is that both parents work flexible hours and share child care (37%), or one parent stays home part time (12%). If mothers could snap their fingers and have the work arrangement they wanted, the net result would be massive flows into part-time work — both from those mothers currently working full time and those currently not working for pay at all. The family demands more, not less, flexible work arrangements. ... Su’s magnum opus, AB-5, effectively outlaws part-time contract work in many fields in California. It basically says 'full time or nothing at all' to a lot of workers who would rather not be 40-hour-a-week wage slaves."

One more opinion piece from the Right: No to Julie Su as Labor Secretary The Editors, National Review

FLAG THIS

Around 6 in 10 Say Declining Union Representation Is "A Bad Thing"

Polling data released last month shows a majority of US adults consider it a negative that a declining number of workers are represented by unions. Respondents felt that held true for the American worker (58%) and the US as a whole (61%).

In 1983, 20% of all of US workers were union members. As of last year, that number had slipped to 10%.

Along party lines, 76% of Democrats and Democrat-leaning Independents say declining union membership is bad for workers, while just 4 in 10 Republicans agree. (Pew Research)

In 2023, how do unions impact the US?

FLAG FINDS

Rich Returns, Shade On Sale, Folio on the Go

🖼️ >10% returns aren't just for the 1%. The world’s richest investors have been using this under the radar asset to preserve their wealth for centuries. Now, thanks to Masterworks, everyday investors are using contemporary art to collect double and even triple digit annualized returns. If you’re looking for an asset class that’s already delivering solid returns without the day to day volatility of the stock market, check out Masterworks.com.

☀️ The days are getting longer and the sun is getting hotter. So why not buy yourself some premium shade? At 39% off, this sail canopy from Love Story will set you back less than 50 cents per square foot. Check it out now while the price is right and enjoy the shade all summer long.

📚 Does your mother love to read? Here’s a gift for her that’s not just this month’s James Patterson or Jodi Picoult title. It’s a portable bookshelf you don’t even have to get off the couch to reach, so you can devour one book and start another in a single sitting — literally. Get ahead of Mother’s Day by buying your gift today.

WATERCOOLER

Loch Ness Monster "Sighting", Better Home Fries, Iconic Short Stories

The modern legend of the Loch Ness Monster is born when a sighting makes local news on May 2, 1933. What the newspaper Inverness Courier dubs a “monster” then becomes a media phenomenon, with London newspapers sending correspondents to Scotland and a circus offering a 20,000 pound sterling reward for capture of the beast.

The Kitchn: The Secret to Better Home Fries? Cook Them Like the French Do

Atlas Obsura: Ranking the Pain of Stinging Insects, From ‘Spicy’ to ‘Shockingly Electric’

Literary Hub: 43 of the Most Iconic Short Stories in the English Language

Today I Learned that the famous Indian dish, tikka masala, is not some cultural cuisine that’s been around for ages. It was invented in the 70’s — in Great Britain.

Reply

or to participate.