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Notes on the Crises
Personal blog · crisesnotes.comeconomicspolitics
Notes on the Crises is a personal blog at crisesnotes.com about economics and politics. Since 2021, 27 different Hacker News readers have linked it 36 times, most often “Payments crisis of 2025: Not “read only” access anymore”. It is still writing: the last post was on 2026-10-30, and you can follow it by feed.
Too few sampled comments (18) to say how often HN recommends it.?
Why HN links it
Nathan Tankus' newsletter on US macro-finance, Treasury payments and DOGE access, bank deposit insurance and AI-boom financing. HN readers cite it as a source; one calls a post on AI financing excellent.
Summarised by Claude from a sample of 18 HN comments that link here. Each comment is marked recommending, critical or neutral (citing without judging); how this works.
Coverage of the ongoing Impoundment and Unitary Executive Constitutional Crisis
Most-linked posts?
- Payments crisis of 2025: Not “read only” access anymore3 people · 3 mentions · first linked 2025-02-04
- /elon-musk-wants-to-get-operational-control-of-the-treasurys-payment-system-this-could-not-possibly-be-more-dangerous/3 people · 3 mentions · first linked 2025-02-03
- /3 people · 3 mentions · first linked 2025-02-11
- AI Bond Issuance Is Not AI's "Subprime Mortgage Crisis"3 people · 3 mentions · first linked 2026-07-30
- Every complex banking issue all at once: the failure of SVB in one brief summary2 people · 2 mentions · first linked 2023-03-16
- Doomsday Book (2006) [pdf]2 people · 2 mentions · first linked 2024-07-26
What Hacker News says?
some different takes: https://www.crisesnotes.com/elon-musk-wants-to-get-operation... https://popular.info/p/musk-associates-given-unfettered no matter political affiliation, this should be alarming the level of access these people have been given without security clearances etc. this is a national security issue.
Comment linking /elon-musk-wants-to-get-operational-control-of-the-treasurys-payment-system-this-could-not-possibly-be-more-dangerous/
on “The young, inexperienced engineers aiding DOGE”Submitted Payments crisis of 2025: Not “read only” access anymore as a story · 562 points
HN discussionToo late, Musk already has direct access to Treasury systems: https://www.crisesnotes.com/elon-musk-wants-to-get-operation... And can incite people against anything he chooses on X, like: https://x.com/elonmusk/status/1885964969335808217 and he can certainly act quicker than any checks and ballances. We'll see how the system works to get rid of the chaos monkey on the inside.
Comment linking /elon-musk-wants-to-get-operational-control-of-the-treasurys-payment-system-this-could-not-possibly-be-more-dangerous/
on “The young, inexperienced engineers aiding DOGE”Submitted Doomsday Book (2006) [pdf] as a story · 285 points
HN discussionhttps://www.crisesnotes.com/elon-musk-wants-to-get-operation... > I try to keep emotion out of this newsletter. I have always tried to write Notes on the Crises in a calm, detached tone so that the information I highlight shines through. However, I must be honest with readers: I’m absolutely terrified. When I first read the Washington Post’s reporting I subsequently had a panic attack. I am not subject to those. I d…
Comment linking /elon-musk-wants-to-get-operational-control-of-the-treasurys-payment-system-this-could-not-possibly-be-more-dangerous/
on “The young, inexperienced engineers aiding DOGE”Submitted Day 5 of Trump-Musk and Treasury Payments: Not "Read Only" Access Anymore as a story · 33 points
HN discussionhttps://www.crisesnotes.com/
Comment linking /
on “Teen on Musk's DOGE team graduated from 'The Com'”Submitted Everything About Trump's Spending Freeze Order You Were Too Afraid to Ask as a story · 11 points
HN discussionIn this case, it is. Zitron does not possess even the most basic knowledge about the issues and practices he complains about. For example: https://www.crisesnotes.com/sigh-no-ed-zitron-ai-bond-issuan...
Comment linking /sigh-no-ed-zitron-ai-bond-issuance-is-not-ais-subprime-mortgage-crisis/
on “How accurate have Ed Zitron's AI skeptic predictions been?”Submitted Afternoon of Day 7 of the Treasury Payments Crisis of 2025 as a story · 8 points
HN discussionMacrofinance expert Nathan Tankus has an excellent post on why the financing situation around the AI boom is just not big enough to mess up the financial system. https://www.crisesnotes.com/sigh-no-ed-zitron-ai-bond-issuan...
Comment linking /sigh-no-ed-zitron-ai-bond-issuance-is-not-ais-subprime-mortgage-crisis/
on “How accurate have Ed Zitron's AI skeptic predictions been?”Submitted Federal Reserve "Doomsday Book" [pdf] (2006) as a story · 5 points
HN discussionHere are links to the episodes, for anyone interested. April 2025 interview: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/some-of-americas-most-... August 2025 interview (after BLS head statistician was fired): https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/bill-beach-on-how-trum... Some notes and a transcript: https://www.crisesnotes.com/bloomberg-odd-lots-podcast-trans...
Comment linking /bloomberg-odd-lots-podcast-transcript-an-interview-with-former-bls-commissioner-bill-beach/
on “U.S. added 911k fewer jobs in year through March than reported earlier”Submitted I Got the Fed to Release Its 2011 "Treasury Default" Playbook as a story · 4 points
HN discussionIt's the best data that's available at the time. It's been collected in a consistent fashion for a significant duration of time. To understand how a new methodology would differ, we'd want to run a new process in parallel for a couple years. A few notes from an interview on the Odd Lots podcast, interviewing Bill Beach, former head of the BLS: * Response rates among surveyed employees are roughly: Month 1 68% Month…
Comment linking /bloomberg-odd-lots-podcast-transcript-an-interview-with-former-bls-commissioner-bill-beach/
on “U.S. added 911k fewer jobs in year through March than reported earlier”Submitted Why Visiting Fort Knox Is Not About Selling Gold but Is About Buying Bitcoin as a story · 3 points
HN discussionI do not have to wait 4 years, if it looks like a duck, walks like a duck, and quacks like a duck, then it is most likely a duck. The fact that he is "governing" through EOs, - many of those will be challenged in court, I guess, but in the meantime they still stand valid - is not being done in a respectful way. An example, regular citizens working for Trump having access to not only read but also write on the federa…
Comment linking /day-five-of-the-trump-musk-treasury-payments-crisis-of-2025-not-read-only-access-anymore/
on “GitHub reveals how software engineers are purging federal databases”Submitted 30k Pages of Federal Reserve Board Meeting Minutes Obtained Through FOIA as a story · 2 points
HN discussion> The so-called Doomsday Book, an internal document used to guide the Federal Reserve’s actions during emergencies, has long been the subject of intrigue and suspicion. Largely a compilation of legal opinions, the book has been a key resource for the Federal Reserve Bank of New York for decades, allowing it to play a unique and oversize role during financial crises. No other regional Federal Reserve bank has such a…
Comment linking /the-new-york-federal-reserves-doomsday-book-has-been-partially-revealed/
on “Doomsday Book (2006) [pdf]”Submitted 30k Pages of Federal Reserve Board Meeting Minutes as a story · 2 points
HN discussionKrugman is the best-sounding stuff of the mainstream. Since that what you brought up, I would start with https://www.crisesnotes.com/paul-krugman-functional-finance-... . Arguable Krugman is so good about not saying terrible stupid shit, that it might come at at cost of not being internally consistent or acknowledging when his views in fact change. Krugman at least was a "New Keynsian", which is a very complicated c…
Comment linking /paul-krugman-functional-finance-flip-flop/
on “Does QE Cause Wealth Inequality?”Submitted AI Bond Issuance Is Not AI's "Subprime Mortgage Crisis" as a story · 1 points
HN discussionI want the hype to die and the bubble to pop as much as Ed and Cory and everyone else writing about it but right now it’s just them basically recycling the same bad news and posting about it. I’d love to see some writing which looks at the factors which caused previous pops and to line them up with factors today to try and determine what’s actually coming. Clearly the market is irrational as hell right now but seemi…
Comment linking /
on “The (economic) AI apocalypse is nigh”Submitted I was wrong about post-SVB treasury market strains. Here’s why as a story · 1 points
HN discussionyeah but if I get a 4.25% FDIC insured I’ll prefer that and take the 0.75% loss. https://www.crisesnotes.com/i-got-the-fed-to-release-its-201...
Comment linking /i-got-the-fed-to-release-its-2011-treasury-default-playbook-heres-what-it-says-and-why-it-matters/?ref=notes-on-the-crises-newsletter
on “Ditch banks – Go with money market funds and treasuries”Submitted Federal Reserve Issued Securities: Not Such a Crazy Idea After All as a story · 1 points
HN discussionMuch more detail available in the linked blog post, written by the author: https://www.crisesnotes.com/can-the-trump-administration-arb...
Comment linking /can-the-trump-administration-arbitrarily-take-money-from-anyones-bank-account/
on “Can Trump Arbitrarily Take Money from Anyone's Bank Account?”Submitted Every Complex Banking Issue All at Once: The Failure of SVB as a story · 1 points
HN discussionI was pleased to read Nathan Tankus' take[1] on all this, although I wish I understood it better, which was that a lot of policy ideas that have been somewhat fringe are becoming mainstream in the last week: > The prospect of unlimited deposit insurance, whether de facto or de jure, is leading to a large-scale reconsideration of views among even “moderate” banking scholars. I imagine that's usually how real policy p…
on “How deep is the rot in America’s banking industry?”Submitted Every complex banking issue all at once: the failure of SVB in one brief summary as a story · 1 points
HN discussion
