Analysis Topic: Economic Trends Analysis
The analysis published under this topic are as follows.Thursday, December 20, 2012
Economic Signs That Deflation is Far From Over / Economics / Deflation
The federal government defines the Producer Price Index (PPI) as "the average change over time in the selling prices received by domestic producers for their output."
With help from the Federal Reserve's massive inflationary policies, the PPI has climbed even as the economy began to fall in 2008-09.
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Wednesday, December 19, 2012
Bank of England Inflation Fraud Holds Steady at CPI 2.7%, RPI 3%, and Real 3.9% / Economics / Inflation
The mainstream press played its part in perpetuating the Government's debt / money printing arm's (Bank of England) continuing inflation fraud with matter of fact coverage of today's CPI inflation rate holding steady at 2.7%. The reality is that the Inflation fraud is at the very core of why the general population is continually forced to work ever harder and to accumulate ever greater amounts of debt (slavery) all to just stand still in terms of being able to cope with the real cost of living increases that are NOT reflected by official CPI.
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Sunday, December 16, 2012
U.S. Boomer Demographics and the Unemployment Rate / Economics / Demographics
A week ago in Startling Look at Job Demographics by Age I posted the following chart made with data that I downloaded from the St. Louis Fed.
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Saturday, December 15, 2012
What Inflation Means For You: Inside the Consumer Price Index CPI / Economics / Inflation
Courtesy of Doug Short. The Fed justified a previous round of quantitative easing “to promote a stronger pace of economic recovery and to help ensure that inflation, over time, is at levels consistent with its mandate” (full text). In effect, the Fed has been trying to increase inflation, operating at the macro level. But what does an increase in inflation mean at the micro level — specifically to your household?
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Saturday, December 15, 2012
Fed Policy of Phony Economic Growth Will Destroy the U.S. Dollar / Economics / US Economy
By upping the ante once again in its gamble to revive the lethargic economy through monetary action, the Federal Reserve's Open Market Committee is now compelling the rest of us to buy into a game that we may not be able to afford. At his press conference this week, Fed Chairman Bernanke explained how the easiest policy stance in Fed history has just gotten that much easier. First it gave us zero interest rates, then QEs I and II, Operation Twist, and finally "unlimited" QE3.
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Thursday, December 13, 2012
U.S. Economy, We Can Ignore Reality! / Economics / US Economy
“We can ignore reality, but we cannot ignore the consequences of ignoring reality.” Ayn Rand
With apologies to Ayn Rand, let’s explore some examples of ignoring reality.
We can ignore the (U.S. government) deficit, but we cannot ignore the consequences of ignoring the deficit. If the deficit increases each year, the total debt will soon be so out of control that it is unpayable. Oops, the United States is there now. The consequences that we cannot ignore are:
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Thursday, December 13, 2012
U.S. Unemployment, What if the BLS Labor Force Participation Rate Projections Are Wrong? / Economics / Unemployment
On Monday, my "question of the day" was What will the unemployment rate look like for the rest of the decade?
Click on the above link to see an interactive map that lets you select the rate of job growth up to January of 2020.
Wednesday, December 12, 2012
BlackRock's Fink: Very Bullish on US Economy 2013 / Economics / US Economy
Larry Fink, CEO of BlackRock, guest hosted Bloomberg TV's "Market Makers" with Erik Schatzker and Stephanie Ruhle today. Fink said that he's "very bullish" on the United States and "our corporations are in fabulous shape with $1.7 trillion in cash...I don't believe you're going to see that much default risk in the next few years."
Fink also said that "95% of the people that are talking about [the fiscal cliff] have no clue" and "I think we will find a solution."
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Tuesday, December 11, 2012
Global Employment Condition Gives Central Banks More Ammo / Economics / Employment
The prevailing wisdom currently on Wall Street is that gold and commodity stocks will go nowhere next year because interest rates are about to rise in real terms. For instance, last week Goldman Sachs cut its 12-month gold-price forecast by 7.2%. The precious metal "is near an inflection point," according to the firm. And while the metal may rally slightly in 2013, a growing U.S. economy and a gradual rise in real interest rates may send investors towards other investments, their analysts said.
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Tuesday, December 11, 2012
Global Economic Growth Estimates Slashed for 2013 / Economics / Global Economy
Sasha Cekerevac writes: I realize many people might be getting tired of hearing about the eurozone and the lack of economic growth in that union; however, we must be aware that what does occur in the eurozone and the trajectory of its economic growth can and will have an impact on the American economy. The global economy is more closely tied together now than ever before, and a lack of economic growth in one area could spread into another nation.
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Monday, December 10, 2012
McJobs, Why You Shouldn’t Get Too Excited About the U.S. Jobs Picture / Economics / Employment
George Leong writes: The labor picture remains precarious. On one hand, Citigroup, Inc. (NYSE/C) announced it was cutting 11,000 jobs worldwide, as the financial services sector continues to be hard hit; while on the other hand, Apple Inc. (NASDAQ/AAPL) announced it would produce at least one of its computer products in the United States.
Wall Street was relieved last Friday after the much-anticipated jobs readings offered much-needed hope that job creation in America continues to be on track.
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Sunday, December 09, 2012
Startling Look at U.S. Job Demographics by Age / Economics / US Economy
ZeroHedge had an interesting set of charts of BLS data in his post Number Of Workers Aged 25-54 Back To April 1997 Levels.
I picked up on that theme and put together this chart of BLS data showing various age groups.
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Sunday, December 09, 2012
U.S. Real Hourly Wages and Hours Worked Analysis / Economics / US Economy
Courtesy of Doug Short. Here is a look at two key numbers in today’s monthly employment report for November: Average Hourly Earnings and Average Weekly Hours. The government has been tracking the data for Production and Nonsupervisory Employees for decades. But coverage of Total Private Employees only dates from March 2006.
Let’s look at the broader series, which goes back far enough to show the trend since before the Great Recession. I want to look closely at a five-snapshot sequence.
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Saturday, December 08, 2012
Why the 98% Matter to the U.S. Economy / Economics / US Economy
George Leong: President Obama is on a fiscal cliff campaign to show why middle-class America really needs the help. Of course, Republicans want the Bush-era tax cuts to also apply to the top two percent of income earners. This is the major sticking point holding up a deal.
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Friday, December 07, 2012
U.S. Labor Market – One Step Forward, Two Steps Back / Economics / Employment
Just when you think things can’t get any more ludicrous or obscene in terms of insulting the truth, out comes the BLS with its monthly jobs numbers. I’m going to break those down in a minute. But wait! There’s much more. We’ve got the fed, which had been promising to raise rates starting in 2010, then 2011, then ’12, and now they’re all the way out in 2015. Double that for the monetization (not just asset purchases). Those programs were supposed to be exited, starting this year. Now those exit plans are going to be redrawn. I’d say at this point they should just drop the charade.
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Friday, December 07, 2012
Economic Depression, Time To Write Off Europe for the Next Decade? / Economics / Great Depression II
The EU is a morally bankrupt blind behemoth that, in a doomed attempt to survive, destroys everything around it just to keep itself standing. In that, it is hardly different from several incarnations of the 20th century politburos in Russia and China - and those are by no means the darkest comparisons that could spring to mind.
There are tons of people working in and for the EU, some of whom are smart while others are not, some who are honest and some who are just self-centred , but the apparatus has become a vortex that sucks in all of them. There many be just a small window left for Europeans to retain a grip on democracy. There's not much left. Stock markets may give the impression that things are going fine, but that is possible only because increasingly severe austerity measures are spreading rapidly, and have now reached the core, not just Greece and Spain. The EU induced illusions will keep coming fast and furious, however, until they don't. And then it will be too late for democracy.
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Friday, December 07, 2012
U.S. Household Net Worth: The ”Real” Story / Economics / US Economy
Courtesy of Doug Short writes: A quick glance at the complete household net worth data series in a linear chart shows a distinct bubble in net worth that peaked in Q4 2007 with a trough in Q1 2009, the quarter the equity markets bottomed. The latest Fed balance sheet shows a total net worth that is 26.4% above the 2009 trough but still 3.8% below the 2007 peak. The nominal Q3 net worth is up 2.7% from Q2 and up 10.4% year over year.
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Thursday, December 06, 2012
U.S. Census Bureau - Manufacturing Report / Economics / US Economy
ForexAbode writes:
Summary:
October 2012 new orders for manufactured durable goods increased 0.8 percent, to $477.6 billion. Shipments rose 0.4 percent, to $482.3 billion. Unfilled orders increased 0.3 percent, to $982.9 billion. And inventories rose 0.1 percent, to $616.0 billion.
Thursday, December 06, 2012
Finger Prints of Recession 2013, Recipe for Economic Disaster and Investor Opportunity / Economics / Recession 2013
The verdict is in and the man-made disaster that is creeping socialism just got a green light in the world’s largest economy! The SOMETHING for Nothing society known formally as the United States of America and controlled by what Vladimir Lenin called USEFUL IDIOTS (products of centrally controlled public schools taught the VIRTUES of socialism as beneficial) have now elevated their chosen REPRESENTATIVES as slave masters (at the point of a government GUN) to the last vestiges of the private sector that still produce more than they consume.
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Wednesday, December 05, 2012
George Osborne's Smoke and Mirrors Economic Austerity Cuts, Deficit and Debt / Economics / Economic Austerity
George Osborne in his Autumn Statement today will announce a further smoke and mirrors call to arms for greater economic austerity for the purpose of cutting the deficit and paying down Britain's debt, despite the fact that during the past 3 years there has been no real net economic austerity as the deficit has soared back to over £120 billion pear year and public debt remains on the exact same trajectory as it was on BEFORE the last general election, which illustrates a fundamental point that neither labour nor the Conservatives actually want the deficit and debt to reduce but instead utilise debt in the support of their differing ideologies where for Labour high debt to GDP as an Keynesian excuse to expand the size of the economy through the public sector and for the Conservatives to reduce the size of the Labour voting public sector and benefits claiming voter pool via economic austerity and to expand the economy via lower taxes for the private sector.
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