Analysis Topic: Economic Trends Analysis
The analysis published under this topic are as follows.Friday, August 28, 2009
Beware the Mass Media, A Pack of Lying Morons / Economics / Mainstream Media
Jack D. Douglas writes: The Mass Media reports on almost all economic issues more complex than buying a hamburger are very misleading at all times and are catastrophically misleading in this Great Crisis in which almost everything is distorted in Rube Goldberg ways by the Fed, FDIC, and scores of other agencies and giveaway, subsidy programs.
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Friday, August 28, 2009
What a Changing U.S. Savings Ratio and Chinese Falling Export Rate Tell Us / Economics / Recession 2008 - 2010
What can we learn from the insight that the U.S. consumer is saving more and Chinese exports are falling? The chart below from Bloomberg has an interesting story to tell. The yellow line represents the falling growth rate of Chinese exports vs. last year. The white line shows the rising savings rate of the U.S. consumer.
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Friday, August 28, 2009
Transition From Financial Crisis to Stagflation / Economics / Stagflation
Now that we are just about 2 years into the world financial/credit crisis, it’s time to ask what is next in one or two years. One is to ask will stagflation emerge in 2010 and after, which is highly gold bullish long term.
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Thursday, August 27, 2009
Jaguar Inflation, An Explanation of the Deflationary Consequences of Government Intervention / Economics / Deflation
This article is part of a syndicated series about deflation from market analyst Robert Prechter, the world's foremost expert on and proponent of the deflationary scenario. For more on deflation and how you can survive it, download Prechter's FREE 60-page Deflation Survival eBook , part of Prechter's NEW Deflation Survival Guide.
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Thursday, August 27, 2009
The Process of Creative Distruction of Corporations / Economics / Deflation
Van Hoisington and Lacy Hunt have figured out what few others have, that excessive debt and falling asset prices have conspired to render the best efforts of the Fed impotent.
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Wednesday, August 26, 2009
Current Economic Crisis Still On Track to be Bigger than the Great Depression / Economics / Great Depression II
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Wednesday, August 26, 2009
Leading Economic Indicators Predict the Recession is Over / Economics / Economic Recovery
Claus Vogt writes: Last Thursday the Conference Board released the July reading of its Index of Leading Economic Indicators (LEI). Year-over-year it was up by 0.2 percent. This is the first reading in the plus column since 2007.
So … what does this clear improvement tell us? How important is it? Does it give us an all clear signal that a strong recovery is on its way?
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Wednesday, August 26, 2009
The Free Market Caused the Great Depression? / Economics / Economic Theory
Floy Lilley writes: Did you hear the one about bobbing heads on Sunday agreeing that the cause of the Great Depression was the absence of government guidance? "The Great Depression would never have happened if there had been any economic regulations," agreed the policy wonks.
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Wednesday, August 26, 2009
Economic Armageddon, Here We Come / Economics / US Debt
Marty Nemko writes: Obama administration admitted today that the federal debt will, over the next decade, grow wildly larger than it had previously said – so much for a recovery. Now the estimate is $9 trillion!
And that doesn't count the $1.0 to $1.6 trillion Congress is contemplating spending on ObamaCare.
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Tuesday, August 25, 2009
A Student's Guide to Economic History / Economics / Economic Theory
David Gordon writes: [How Capitalism Saved America: The Untold History of Our Country, From the Pilgrims to the Present. By Thomas J. DiLorenzo. Crown Forum, 2004. 295 pages.]
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Tuesday, August 25, 2009
Inflation Breeds Even More Inflation / Economics / Inflation
Thorsten Polleit writes: I. Warning Against Fiduciary Media
Early in the 20th century, Ludwig von Mises warned against the consequences of granting the government control over the money supply. Such a regime inevitably creates money through bank credit that is not backed by real savings — a type of money that Mises termed "fiduciary media."
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Tuesday, August 25, 2009
Gross National Product (GNP): How is it Calculated? What does it Measure? / Economics / Economic Theory
Prof. John Kozy writes: Although the Department of Commerce claims that GDP measures the final value of goods and services produced in the United States in a given period of time, it merely measures the income of the politically sanctioned commercial class. GDP is used as an indicator of how well that commercial class is doing; it is not a measure of the nation's well being.
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Tuesday, August 25, 2009
Gloom Versus Optimism: Is the Global Economic Recession Over? / Economics / Recession 2008 - 2010
Shamus Cooke writes: Few would consider the opinions of the world's central bankers to be unbiased or even accurate. These self-proclaimed wise men of international finance didn't see the recession coming until it blew up in their faces — a blast that destroyed their credibility.
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Tuesday, August 25, 2009
Premature Exiting From Quantitative Easing Could Derail the Economic Recovery / Economics / Quantitative Easing
There is the strong possibility that policy makers in the US and UK will not time the transition from the current quantitative easing to a more tightened monetary policy. That is not because they are no competent. It is because the task is very tricky and there is no play book outlining the steps. This is not Tom Landry (former Dallas Cowboy coach) pacing the field with a play for every situation already planned and practiced well in advance.
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Monday, August 24, 2009
Death of the Consumer / Economics / Recession 2008 - 2010
Moving forward, the most critical indicator of the viability of our economy will be consumer spending. Simply put, without a buoyant consumer, there will be no recovery. Due no doubt to the negative characteristics of consumer data, the death of the consumer is receiving scant coverage.
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Sunday, August 23, 2009
Searching for the Economic Depression and Finding It / Economics / Great Depression II
Last week I was telling a visiting filmmaker from overseas about the financial crisis and how it was getting worse. He looked at me askance. The market had just gone up, he said, and the White House was talking about an emerging recovery.
“I have been in New York before, he said, and it looks the same.”
Saturday, August 22, 2009
Lending Reversals: East and West Compared / Economics / Economic Stimulus
The chorus singing of the need to separate commodities from broader views of market movement appears to be growing again. It’s possible to separate this into “supply constraint” and “Asia rising camps”, but in general it is recognized that both come into play. Supply constraint singers realize that the mineral commodities sector was under capitalized for a long period beginning about 1980. Asia rising tunes increasingly look back to the last decade to recognize that mineral prices were already tied to Asian growth in the 1990s.Read full article... Read full article...
Friday, August 21, 2009
Debt Fuelled Economic Recovery Leading to What? / Economics / Economic Theory
Last week’s essay centered on the fact that America has borrowed nearly $12 trillion dollars yet achieved very little, if any real economic growth in the last half century. If that wasn’t alarming enough, this week’s effort should suffice to turn some heads. While last week we used the broadest monetary aggregate M3 to discount GDP, this week we’re going to take a look at velocity of circulation in the M2 aggregate and translate that into some logical conclusions. Politicians, the Conference Board and nearly every alphabet soup media outlet known to man are trying to talk this economy out of recession. We already know that talk is cheap, but I have a distinct suspicion that we’re soon going to find out exactly how cheap it really is.
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Friday, August 21, 2009
Cash for Clunkers Strategy of Destroying Working Assets / Economics / Economic Stimulus
After having given away billions faster than even the optimists had anticipated, it was announced today that the federal government's "Cash for Clunkers" program is coming to an early end. But, based on the standards of economic analysis which prevail in Washington, Wall Street and academia, the program must be considered a master stroke of public policy.
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Friday, August 21, 2009
Europe Economic Recovery, Rhetoric and Reality / Economics / Euro-Zone
Ulrich Rippert writes: In Paris and Berlin, politicians and sections of the media are speaking euphorically of an end to the recession and the start of an economic upturn.
Writing in the German business newspaper Handelsblatt, Torsten Riecke declares, “The harshest downturn since the Second World War is over. The nightmare is at an end.”
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