Analysis Topic: Economic Trends Analysis
The analysis published under this topic are as follows.Sunday, September 06, 2009
Government Economic Stimulus, How Many Rabbits Are Left In The Hat? / Economics / Economic Stimulus
As amazing as it seems, inquiring minds are interested in hats and rabbit, more specifically, "How Many Rabbits Are Left In The Hat?"
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Saturday, September 05, 2009
America's Economic Crisis, Forecasting Worse Ahead / Economics / Great Depression II
Austrian economist Ludwig von Mises (1881 - 1973) said:"There is no means of avoiding a final collapse of a boom brought about by credit expansion. The alternative is only whether the crisis should come sooner as a result of a voluntary abandonment of further credit expansion, or later as a final and total catastrophe of the currency system involved."
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Saturday, September 05, 2009
Failure of Economics, the Super Trend and Elements of Deflation / Economics / Economic Theory
The Elements of Deflation
The Failure of Economics
The Super Trend Puzzle
Final Demand and Income
Unemployment Was NOT a Green Shoot
As every school child knows, water is formed by the two elements of hydrogen and oxygen in a very simple formula we all know as H2O. Today we start a series that starts with the question, What are the elements that comprise deflation? Far from being simple, the "equation" for deflation is as complex as that of DNA. And sadly, while the genome project has helped us with great insights into how DNA works, economic analysis is still back in the 1950s when it comes to decoding deflation. Notwithstanding the paucity of understanding we can glean from the dismal science, in this week's letter we will start thinking about the most fundamentally important question of the day: is inflation, or deflation, in our future?
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Friday, September 04, 2009
Global Recession Or Low Carbon / Economics / Recession 2008 - 2010
Keynesian Boom and Bust - Like we know, the recent and continuing massive spending spree by nearly all G20 governmentsand their central banks, described as "fighting recession", is also called Keynesian. To be sure, this process of handing over or "injecting" perhaps $ 4 000 billion since around October 2008 (using IMF data), mostly into the bank, insurance and finance sector in OECD countries, is Keynesian in one sense. National debts and government budget deficits have been increased, often radically. Several east European members of the EU27, and most famously Iceland, as well as Ireland, Pakistan, the UK and USA, and some other countries have seen foreign and/or national debt grow so fast their public finances are now structurally unsound. If economic growth does not return soon, and continue for at least a year or two, the unthinkable prospect of central bank failure will return, in several of these countries. We can note that the approximate $ 4 trillion of 'Keynesian bailouts' in the OECD countries, since late 2008, is equivalent to roughly 6.5% of world total GDP in 2008, also using IMF data.
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Friday, September 04, 2009
U.S. Jobs Contract 20th Straight Month; Unemployment Rate Hits 9.7% / Economics / Recession 2008 - 2010
In January I forecast the unemployment rate would hit 9.8% by August. Meanwhile, even though it was clear the Fed was wildly off base in its adverse scenario, the Fed upped it total to a mere 9.2% to 9.6% for the year as noted in Fed's Economic Forecast Worsens; Still Ridiculously Optimistic.
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Friday, September 04, 2009
U.S. Ski-Jump Recession, How Bad Will It Get? / Economics / Recession 2008 - 2010
The U.S. economy is at the beginning of a protracted period of adjustment. The sharp decline in business activity, which began in the summer of 2007, has moderated slightly, but there are few indications that growth will return to pre-crisis levels. Stocks have performed well in the last six months, beating most analysts expectations, but weakness in the underlying economy will continue to crimp demand reducing any chance of a strong rebound. Bankruptcies, delinquencies and defaults are all on the rise, which is pushing down asset prices and increasing unemployment.
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Friday, September 04, 2009
Not Enough Work to Go Around This Labor Day / Economics / Recession 2008 - 2010
Mike Larson writes: Home prices have plunged so far that buyers are tentatively stepping back into the housing market again …
And government largesse in the form of “Cash for Clunkers” giveaways has helped spur a rebound in auto sales …
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Friday, September 04, 2009
Daily Economic Outlook, U.S. Non Farm Payroll Potential For Surprise / Economics / US Economy
Data from the US this week, notably the stronger-than-expected outcomes of the manufacturing and services ISM surveys, have raised the likelihood that the economy has returned to growth in the current quarter, ending the longest contraction since quarterly records started in 1947. However, the focus today is squarely on the labour market, an area of the economy that will significantly lag the wider recovery and represents the main downside risk to sustained economic growth.
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Friday, September 04, 2009
The Economic Black Hole / Economics / Recession 2008 - 2010
have been receiving many interesting emails lately from all areas of the country, international as well. I would like to share some of them with you.
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Friday, September 04, 2009
How Much of China's Export Industry Is Owned By US Corporations? / Economics / China Economy
I don't know much about China but I know about free zones.
From 1990 to 1995 my partner and I wrote the "playbook" to entice foreign companies into the Jebel Ali Free Zone in Dubai, during that period the number of companies went from 500 to 3,000 (an increase of an average of about 40% a year), we also set up interviews with the new arrivals in to understand what were the deciding factors, and we worked out how much the zone contributed to the development of Dubai. It was considerable, in my opinion the main driver of the Dubai economy which grew in nominal terms at a rate of 15% a year since 1990 was free zones (real estate came later and that was driven by the economic growth not the other way around).
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Thursday, September 03, 2009
Keynesian Economists Push the US Economy Over the Cliff / Economics / Recession 2008 - 2010
Do you remember the old joke about a guy who jumps off a fifty-storey building?
As he passes each floor he thinks to himself, "Well … so far so good."
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Wednesday, September 02, 2009
Is Venezuela's Stagflation the Beginning of the End for Chavez? / Economics / Venezuela
Jason Simpkins writes: It wasn't long ago that Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez's decision to nationalize state oil company Petroleos de Venezuela SA (PDVSA) resulted in a failed coup that very nearly cost him his post.
Now, Chavez's aggressive economic policies are again being called into question, this time as the country slides into what could be a protracted period of stagflation, which is defined by the exasperating mixture of torpid economic growth and high inflation.
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Wednesday, September 02, 2009
Western European Q2 Economic Performance Leads Recovery / Economics / Economic Recovery
Deleted.
Tuesday, September 01, 2009
Does Loose Monetary Policy Cause Economic Growth? / Economics / Economic Theory
At the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City's annual economic symposium, held in Jackson Hole, Wyoming on August 21, 2009, Ben Bernanke expressed satisfaction with the action that his administration undertook to save the financial system. According to Bernanke,
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Tuesday, September 01, 2009
Karl Marx and the Global Economic Crisis / Economics / Economic Theory
Are we getting good Marx? I think not
I often wonder how Karl Marx would react were he to find himself here, right now? After all, he too lived through momentous and world-changing times, perhaps even more so than the changes we are experiencing, given that his was the world that gave birth to the rise of the Machine and capitalism as we know it. Born on the cusp so-to-speak and I too, was born on the cusp, 23 July, 1945, a couple of weeks before the empire showed the world that it was truly barbarian when it dropped atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
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Tuesday, September 01, 2009
Global Economic Recession And Low Carbon : A Complex Mixture / Economics / Recession 2008 - 2010
Keynesian Boom and Bust - Like we know, the recent and continuing massive spending spree by nearly all G20 governments and their central banks, described as "fighting recession", is also called Keynesian. One important point is that Keynesian-type deficit spending as a way to fight recession was never applied as Keynes himself recommended and advised, simply because he explained it in such strange ways, and because the idea of deficit spending did not become official policy and mainstream economic thinking in his lifetime. To be sure, arguments can be made that 'the Bretton Woods world', creation of the IMF and IBRD, state economic interventionism and macro management, and sometimes micro management of local economies and sectors inside them, were all 'Keynesian inspired'.
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Tuesday, September 01, 2009
Deflation Is A ***** / Economics / Deflation
The latest Thought's From The Frontline by John Mauldin is a gem. It is about the crisis in Spain through the eyes of Variant Perception.
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Tuesday, September 01, 2009
Economic Recovery Underway But Double-Dip Recession Risk Remains / Economics / Recession 2008 - 2010
Consumers Are Not Saving Yet - Over the last months, we have seen articles discussing the dramatic surge of Personal Saving Rate as % of Disposable Income and how America shifted from consumer-driven to saving-driven. Most observers forgot to mention Personal Saving Rate Ex Transfer Payments As % of Disposable Income actually kept declining since May 2008 and this can be seen on the chart below. This means such frugal lifestyle is not happening yet although it might occur in a not so distant future once consumers decrease their Financial Obligations Ratio, a measure of debt.
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Tuesday, September 01, 2009
Spain, The Financial Black Hole In Europe's Balance Sheet / Economics / Euro-Zone
Today's offering for this week's Outside the Box starts off with a quote from Titus Maccius Plautus: "I am a rich man as long as I don't pay my creditors." Even 2200 years ago, it seems that problems of credit were an issue.
I talked last Friday about the US being faced with a number of bad choices. But it is not just the US. Today we look at a piece from my friends at Variant Perception based on London. They are a relatively new institutional research house. I have been reading their material for some time and have begun to look very much forward to it. They do some very good in-depth analysis. I asked then to shorten a piece they did on Spain and Spanish banks for this week's Outside the Box. Spain will soon be faced with a number of very uncomfortable choices, but for now they appear in denial.
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Tuesday, September 01, 2009
Failure of U.S. Money Supply to Grow Points to Economic Stagnation and Monetization of Debt / Economics / Money Supply
Investors should be taking some clues from the thinking of American voters. Their view, as documented by the respected Rasmusen polling organization, is rejection of the growth killing policies of the Obama Regime. Per Rasmusen, a mere 46% of voters approve of Obama Regime while 53% disapprove. The vote is in on the economic prospects for the U.S. due to policies of the failing and fading Obama Regime, and it is in the negative column.
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