{"id":91333,"date":"2026-07-11T01:00:36","date_gmt":"2026-07-11T08:00:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lenpenzo.com\/blog\/?p=91333"},"modified":"2026-07-09T10:16:24","modified_gmt":"2026-07-09T17:16:24","slug":"black-coffee-11-july-2026","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lenpenzo.com\/blog\/id91333-black-coffee-11-july-2026.html","title":{"rendered":"Black Coffee: A Fiat Fiesta"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"It’s time to sit back, relax and enjoy a little joe …<\/em><\/p>\n

Welcome to another rousing edition of Black Coffee, your off-beat weekly round-up of what’s been going on in the world of money and personal finance.<\/p>\n

I hope everybody had a wonderful week. And with that, let\u2019s get right to this week\u2019s commentary, shall we?<\/p>\n

I know this is war, but everyone is still trying to pretend it’s a party.<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

\u2013 Kristin Cashore<\/strong><\/p>\n

Credits and Debits<\/strong><\/p>\n

Debit:<\/strong><\/span> Did you see this? If you thought this year\u2019s Independence Day cookout was more expensive than last year, you weren\u2019t going crazy. It turns out that the average Fourth of July cookout for 10 people this year cost $73.82<\/a>. For those of you who are really<\/strong><\/em> crummy at math, that\u2019s $7.38 a person. It\u2019s also a 4% increase over 2025. As for the main culprit? Well\u2026 it was largely driven by higher costs for ground beef and hamburger buns. It’s enough to make many people consider veganism. Or not…<\/p>\n

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\nDebit:<\/strong><\/span> Meanwhile, a new Fed study estimates that the federal government’s decision to tacitly promote illegal immigrant worker flows between 2021 and 2024 accounted for roughly 30% of US employment growth. More to the point: That growth also translated to a 2.2% increase in US home prices<\/a> and a 1.4% rise in rents. Oh, and to nobody\u2019s<\/strong><\/em> surprise, those researchers also found that homebuilding was unable to meet that additional demand. Instead, the influx acted as a housing demand shock in markets where supply was already constrained. Talk about a major policy error. Oh, and speaking of big mistakes…<\/p>\n

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Debit:<\/strong><\/span> On a related note, the latest jobs report was released last week and it shows that the US labor force participation rate dropped to 61.5%<\/a> in June \u2013 that just happens to be the lowest level since March 2021. At least this isn\u2019t a concern for the gainfully-employed. Well\u2026 at least for now, anyway. In the meantime…<\/p>\n

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Debit:<\/strong><\/span> Unfortunately, the situation gets even worse when one looks under the hood of the latest jobs report. This is because while the number of part-time jobs declined by 53,000, workers holding full-time positions collapsed by a whopping 514,000<\/a>. Yes, more than a half-million people! So by any measure, it\u2019s obvious that the composition of the US labor market remains absolutely abysmal. Although we suspect that this<\/strong><\/em> guy hasn\u2019t heard the bad news yet…<\/p>\n