Analysis Topic: Economic Trends Analysis
The analysis published under this topic are as follows.
Tuesday, September 28, 2010
Has the U.S. Economy Improved in the Third Quarter? / Economics / Economic Recovery
By: Sy_Harding
Economic growth in the second quarter slowed to an anemic 1.6% from 5.0% in the December quarter, and 3.7% in the first quarter.Hopes have been that things began picking up again in the third quarter and that last year’s recovery from the recession is back on track.
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Monday, September 27, 2010
Generating Economic Optimism, Put On a Happy Face? / Economics / US Economy
By: Douglas_French
Since two years of zero interest rates, $800 billion in fiscal stimulus, and the bailout of any business remotely viewed as systemically important haven't resuscitated the dead economy, now the tonic suggested is optimism. American business owners and consumers need to quit getting their daubers down and keep the sunny side up.
Monday, September 27, 2010
Consumer Credit Depression, CBO Deficit Armageddon, Government Warnings of Financial Fiascos! / Economics / Great Depression II
By: Martin_D_Weiss
For my family, fiscal balance is not — and never was — a partisan issue. My father, for example, had little interest in politics but was passionate about savings, hard work and avoiding waste.
When I was a toddler, he used to sit me on his knee, teaching me and my older brother that money is not a toy or a game; it’s to be valued, kept in a piggy bank, and treated with due respect.
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Sunday, September 26, 2010
Community Bank Director Chimes In Regarding Small Business Lending / Economics / Credit Crisis 2010
By: Mike_Shedlock
In response to $30 Billion Offer No One Wants - Small Businesses Hit by Deflation I received this email from a director of a small bank.
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Sunday, September 26, 2010
The Economic Impact of More Trade Agreements / Economics / Economic Theory
By: Pravda
Mauro Dias Lourenço writes:In the second half of the twentieth century, Brazil was one of the countries that grew fastest on the planet, especially until 1979, which includes the period of the so-called "economic miracle," from 1967 to 1973. The fact that the phenomenon coincided mostly with the period of military dictatorship (1964-1985) does not mean that resulted from an authoritarian regime in which the State has stimulated the development.
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Sunday, September 26, 2010
QE2, An Invitation to an Inflation Party? / Economics / Quantitative Easing
By: John_Mauldin
This week the Fed altered their end-of-meeting statement by just a few words, but those words have a lot of meaning. It seems they are paving the way to a new round of quantitative easing (QE2), if in their opinion the situation warrants it. A trillion dollars of new money could soon be injected into the system. Tonight we explore some of the implications of a new round of QE. Let's put our speculation hats on, gentle reader, as we are moving into uncharted territory. There are no maps, just theories, and they don't all agree. (Note: this letter may print a little long, as there are a lot of charts.)
Saturday, September 25, 2010
Deflation Hits Small Businesses, No One Wants Obama's $30 Billion / Economics / Deflation
By: Mike_Shedlock
When government passes out the money normally people are lined up, in advance, with both hands out. When that does not happen, it's because the offer smells like a rotten fish.
Saturday, September 25, 2010
Is a Flat Tariff the Answer to America’s Trade Mess? / Economics / Economic Theory
By: Ian_Fletcher
The House Ways and Means Committee has finally approved a bill that would attempt to crack down on Chinese currency manipulation, a key cause of America’s trade deficit, by threatening China with retaliatory tariffs. Leaving aside the bogeyman of a trade war—which China is unlikely to start as the nation running the trade surplus and thus the nation having something to lose—this raises the obvious question of whether tariffs are a plausible long-term solution to America’s trade problems. What would happen, that is, if America reverted to its historical norm (from Independence to after WWII) of being a tariff-protected economy?Read full article... Read full article...
Friday, September 24, 2010
Asia’s Digital Dragon, $80 Billion and 1.1 Billion Users by 2015 / Economics / Technology
By: Dian_L_Chu
With just over 1.3 billion people (as of mid-2008), China accounts for about 20 percent of the world population and needless to say, is the world's largest and most populous country. Although the country’s population growth has been somewhat slowed by the one child policy (in effect since 1979), its internet population has been growing leaps and bounds over the last ten years. (Figure 1)
Friday, September 24, 2010
Partial Equilibrium Analysis – Part 2 / Economics / Economic Theory
By: Andy_Sutton
In the first part of this series, we took at a look at Partial Equilibrium (PE) analysis in terms of analyzing a particular good or service rather than macroeconomic aggregates. What PE allows us to do as well is to both qualitatively and quantitatively assess the true effects of taxes and subsidies. We can also answer whether or not taxes and subsidies represent Pareto efficiencies. For our example we chose to look at the area of gasoline taxes. Many state governments are considering increasing gasoline taxes in the face of collapsing tax receipts. Intuitively, it would seem that such measures would be penny-wise and dollar foolish, but let’s use PE and see if that bears out conventional wisdom.
Friday, September 24, 2010
Raining on the Inflation Parade / Economics / Deflation
By: Seth_Barani
The major components of the dollar index are Euro, Yen and Pound. If Euro and Pound are expected to struggle from sovereign debt crises and Yen to be kept weak by BOJ intervention, why will dollar index fall? Predictions of a weak $DXY (under 70) seem to be built on shaky grounds. The present formula to calculate the dollar index is a very poor representation of dollar's purchasing power, since it does not take into account prices of asset-vehicles beyond a few forex currencies some of which are also manipulated by central banks. It is our belief that dollar index does not show the true nature of inflation/deflation.
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Friday, September 24, 2010
The Irish Economy Collapses As A Result Of The Global Financial Crisis / Economics / Credit Crisis 2010
By: Christopher_Quigley
“A Guarantee Too Far”
Currently the Irish economy is in freefall following the collapse of the real estate market that had expanded ten fold in the decade from 1997 – 2007. The reasons for this “Celtic Tiger” boom are many but in the main it arose due to the following:
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Friday, September 24, 2010
Deflation Reality or Urban Myth? / Economics / Deflation
By: Puru_Saxena
BIG PICTURE: The inflation/deflation debate is now the ‘topic du jour’ and although we have discussed this issue in the past, we want to throw more light on this very important subject.
Today, many prominent economists (Nouriel Roubini, David Rosenberg and Paul Krugman) and fund managers (Bill Gross and Jeremy Grantham) are forecasting deflation and according to these folks, a deflationary contraction is now ‘baked in the cake’. In fact, these deflationists are extremely worried about the ongoing private-sector debt-deleveraging in the developed world and they are also concerned about the lack of aggregate demand in the industrialised nations. Bearing in mind these two factors, these prominent people believe that deflation is now almost guaranteed and inflation is out of the question.
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Friday, September 24, 2010
U.S. Debt the Illegitimate Child Of The Mother Of All Bubbles / Economics / US Debt
By: James_Quinn
There is no doubt the home price bubble inflated by Easy Al Greenspan between 2000 and 2006 was the Mother of All Bubbles. Robert Shiller clearly showed that home prices were two standard deviations above expectations. Despite the unequivocal facts that Dr. Shiller put forth, millions of delusional unsuspecting dupes bought houses at the top of the market. These were the greater fools. They actually believed the drivel being spewed forth by the knuckleheaded anchors on CNBC. They actually believed the propaganda being preached by David Lereah from the National Association of Realtors (Always the Best Time to Buy) about home prices never dropping. They actually believed Bennie Bernanke when he said:
Thursday, September 23, 2010
The Real Economic Cost of Government Is Spending, So What Do You Want to Cut? / Economics / Government Spending
By: Paul_L_Kasriel
One of the biggest issues in this mid-term election is the desire to pare the rate of growth in federal government spending. Economically speaking, this is spot on because the real economic cost of government is how much it spends. Bear in mind, the federal government always gets the funds it needs to pay for its expenditures - through taxation, borrowing and/or "printing." The more the federal government spends, the more productive resources it directs, leaving fewer resources at the disposal of the private sector.
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Thursday, September 23, 2010
Deflation Trend That's Become Too Obvious To Ignore / Economics / Deflation
By: EWI
As the biggest credit bubble in history continues to shrink, consumer prices have stayed flat over the past several months, meaning there is no sign of inflation to come, despite growing commitments from the U.S. government.
So what's keeping inflation at bay, given all the stimulus money promised? The answer: Deflation -- an overwhelming urge for consumers to liquidate their assets for cash. And this new economic phase is finally becoming too obvious to ignore, as explained in recent commentary from the world's largest technical analysis firm.
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Wednesday, September 22, 2010
New 90-page Deflation eBook from Robert Prechter Available Now / Economics / Deflation
By: EWI
As the biggest credit bubble in history continues to shrink, consumer prices have stayed flat over the past several months, meaning there is ZERO sign of inflation in the economy -- despite growing commitments from the U.S. government.
So what's keeping inflation at bay, given all the stimulus money promised? The answer: Deflation -- an overwhelming urge for consumers to liquidate their assets for cash.
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Wednesday, September 22, 2010
Why Government Reports Aren’t the Only Indicators of Economic Health / Economics / Economic Statistics
By: Jared_Levy
When I am not traveling to New York City, Philly or Chicago, I work mostly from my home office. I tend to look out the window while I write and trade. I get a nice view of the Dallas skyline and trees, but I also have a fairly clear view of the neighborhood dry cleaner, whom I have been going to for many years. Over the past year, I have noticed the parking lot fairly empty and the drive-through window not as busy as it used to be.
Wednesday, September 22, 2010
Hooray, the U.S. Recession Is Over! / Economics / Recession 2008 - 2010
By: Robert_Murphy
Some days, it's embarrassing to be a professional economist. On Monday, the National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER) officially declared that our recession had ended — 15 months ago. Yes, that's right, just as more and more analysts are worried about the economy imploding again, the NBER announces that the recession ended back in June 2009. The whole episode underscores the crudity of mainstream economics.
Wednesday, September 22, 2010
Dollar Devaluation, Debt Default, Austerity, Depression and Growing Inflation / Economics / Great Depression II
By: Bob_Chapman
As quantitative easing again gets underway the failure of QE1 becomes more obvious. The crisis worsens and the illusion of any recovery is light years away. Over the past three years almost $13 trillion that we know about has been thrown down a rat hole to bail out banking, Wall Street, insurance and selected elitist entities. The dollar figure is probably much higher. We will never know, because the privately owned Federal Reserve makes its own rules. Everything they do is a state secret. The five successful quarters were only a mirage. The funds have been vaporized among lending and financial institutions worldwide.