Readers of this site know what I think of the economic recovery. There ain’t one! James Quinn provides his take on retail. Let’s begin with one of his graphs: The bars go the wrong way in the two graphs above. This is not a recovery. It looks like a train wreck in progress. The country is over-malled and over-retailed compared [...]
employment
standard Jobs Report: “I Am Shocked”
Another Claude Rains’ “surprise” in today’s Jobs Report! “I am shocked, shocked.” When do “surprises” cease to be surprises? When do apologists for the economy revise their outlook so they are not always surprised? In an honest world, one where economists were attempting to honestly forecast the economy, “surprises” would tend to be bell-shaped. That is, the errors would tend, [...]
standard Did 5% of The Population Win The Lottery?
Sometimes a picture is worth a thousand words. Sometimes much more. The following chart is a Federal Reserve Chart of employment as a percentage of working age adults. We have all seen it before, I think. Now let’s look at it more closely and explore its implications. We all know the economy is recovering because the Administration, their media [...]
standard Implement It To See What’s In It
Before getting too excited over today’s headline jobs number, better read the fine print. Here is some sobering detail from Zerohedge: As a reminder: jobs have quantity and quality components. The quantity component was good enough to convince the 10 Year the taper is imminent (if not stocks, which continue to trade dislocated from any and all fundamentals). But how about the [...]
standard Some Recovery
The “recovery” touted by Bernanke and other Administration sources is dubious. The claims don’t hold up when data are provided. The following chart shows employment. Tim Wallace provided the chart and commented: In our current malaise, we have been at this 5 years and employment is still 2.2 million people below the employment number in April 2008. Moreover, part-time employment is [...]
standard There Is No Recovery
For anyone foolish enough to believe there is a recovery underway, Business Insider provides a slide presentation by David Rosenberg that should disabuse you of any such notion. Mr. Rosenberg is one of the more astute analysts around. His take is that the Federal Reserve is doing all it can to save the economy but there is nothing it can [...]
standard How Rich We Are(n’t)
The chart below shows how wealthy and well-off this country has become with Obama. When fewer and fewer people have to work, that is surely a sign of well-being. Or, it’s a sign of a dead economy and lower standards of living. The media has been telling you that everything is going along just nicely. Look in your wallet and [...]
standard David Stockman Alienates Both Ends of The Political Spectrum
David Stockman wrote an intriguing article which appeared in the NY Times. That it appeared in the Times is noteworthy itself, for it contradicts so many liberal shibboleths the paper has supported (promoted) for many years. Its appearance is less likely to reflect the first steps to Damascus and may be a sign of financial desperation where the need for [...]
standard Stocks Up, Economy Not
This from Forbes: The Bureau of Labor Statistics guessed that 236,000 jobs were added in February and everybody applauded. Yay, or should we say, “boo.” What most everyone missed is that even the BLS admits in a footnote to its February jobs press release that historically its initial number can be revised as much as 90 percent. A 90 percent [...]
standard How Stupid Is The American Public?
The cruelest law of all is the minimum wage. It is the most basic law of economics: if the price rises on a good (ceteris paribus, of course), then less of it will be purchased. Labor is no exception. When you raise the price (i.e., the minimum wage in this case), less labor at the low end of the skill [...]
standard Jobs Report Is A Train Wreck
The report below is typical take-no-prisoners Karl Denninger's interpretation of the latest labor report. Contrary to the rose-colored paint that the media and Wall Street is attempting to smear on this pig, Denninger gets it right with this line: "This report is a train wreck." The Market Ticker – Employment Report: WATCH THE HAIR by genesis The Bureau of Lies and [...]
standard Things Are Getting Worse!
The state of the economy is reflected in the chart below. We are in for a tough time for the next four years. Note: the last data point is that vertical line downward. That is not a border to the chart. H/T to Reader NII for sending this: Yet another reliable indicator suggesting QEs is not having any effect on [...]