Tag Archives: recession

Initial Claims Not Great but Not as Bad as Claimed

by Lee Adler, Wall Street Examiner The media exhibited much consternation today as economists’ consensus guess on first time unemployment claims turned out to be way too optimistic this week. That raised two questions in my mind. Was the number … Continue reading

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Preliminary May 2013 Michigan Consumer Sentiment Highest Since July 2007

by Doug Short, Advisor Perspectives/dshort.com The University of Michigan Consumer Sentiment preliminary number for May came in at 83.7, a major advance over the April final reading of 76.4. This is the highest level since July of 2007, prior to … Continue reading

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Self-defeating Austerity Shocks

by Reda Cherif and Fuad Hasanov, Voxeu.org This article was originally published by Voxeu.org (May 3, 2013) Europe’s austerity-first approach has triggered research-based efforts to evaluate the effectiveness of debt-reduction strategies. This column, based on a US empirical study, suggests … Continue reading

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What Do Weekly Unemployment Claims Tell us About Recession Risk?

by Doug Short, Advisor Perspectives/dshort.com Note from dshort: I’ve updated this commentary to include the latest labor force data in May’s release of the April employment report. Every Thursday I post an update on weekly unemployment claims shortly after the … Continue reading

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Investment and Consumption

by Michael Pettis, China Financial Markets I have been arguing for several years that once China begins the adjustment process, which I expect to characterize the ten-year period of the current administration, growth rates must slow significantly. My expectation for long-term growth … Continue reading

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US Consumers Keep Spending Despite Reduced Pay

by Warren Mosler This article was originally published by Mosler Economics (Apr. 29, 2013) This is the current thinking, but the pieces don’t add up? Hoping I’m being too negative here… Comments below:

Posted in Employment, Personal Income and Consumption, Prices - PPI, CPI and More, money | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , | 1 Comment

Austerity and Growth Perspectives: Europe, the IMF, China, and the US

Written by Elliott Morss, Morss Global Finance Introduction Over the last two decades, the trade-offs between more rapid economic growth and the need for governments to keep their financial houses in order has been a topic of worldwide debate. Controversy … Continue reading

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More Bad News On Dying US Manufacturing

More Bad News On Dying US Manufacturing- Excise Taxes Drop, But Markets Have Reason To Party On by Lee Adler, Wall Street Examiner [While US tax collections on everything went gangbusters in April, absolutely through the roof, there was one … Continue reading

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March Factory Order Rebound Doesn’t Change Dismal Trend

by Lee Adler, Wall Street Examiner New factory orders (actual, adjusted for inflation and not seasonally adjusted), which is a broader measure than durable goods orders because it includes non-durables, dropped 3.3% on a year to year basis in March. … Continue reading

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Payrolls Gain But QE Has No Impact On Growth Rate

by Lee Adler, Wall Street Examiner The BLS today reported a seasonally adjusted (SA) gain of 165,000 in April nonfarm payrolls, beating the consensus estimates of 140,000 to 155,000 from surveys of economists by mainstream media organizations. Surprise, surprise (not) … Continue reading

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March 2013 Manufacturing Is Now Contracting

Written by Steven Hansen US Census says manufacturing new orders declined in March.  Our analysis concurs with the US Census that manufacturing is now contracting. The downward trends in manufacturing new and unfilled orders continues. The downward trend line has … Continue reading

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Everyone’s Missing the Bigger Picture in the Reinhart-Rogoff Debate

by Washington’s Blog, Washington’s Blog The “Excel Spreadsheet Error” in Context You’ve heard that an incredibly influential economic paper by Reinhart and Rogoff (RR) – widely used to justify austerity – has been “busted” for “excel spreadsheet errors” and other … Continue reading

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Productivity 1Q2013 (Preliminary): Productivity Grows Faster than Costs

Written by Steven Hansen A simple summary of this release is that the rate of productivity growth is up , whilst the rate of growth of labor costs is down. Overall, comparing one year ago – productivity is growing faster … Continue reading

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Economic Forecast May 2013: Stable Growth But ….

Written by Steven Hansen Our May 2013 Economic Forecast continues to say the economy will be expanding at a rate similar to April. This month the forecast is accompanied by some economic concerns – and although many data points are … Continue reading

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April 2013 Conference Board Consumer Confidence Big Improvement, But Still Not Good

Written by Doug Short and Steven Hansen The March 2013 Conference Board Consumer Confidence Index had a strong showing after last month’s decline – and still remains at recessionary levels. The market expected this index to come in at 61.0 … Continue reading

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Terminal Velocity (6) Update – “Flying Blind, On Fumes, With No Pilot”

Written by Adam Whitehead, KeySignals.com In Terminal Velocity (4)[i], the possibility and conditions precedent for the “Helicopter” to land at Jackson Hole were discussed. The specific landing conditions were identified in Terminal Velocity (5). These conditions were observed as a … Continue reading

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Final April 2013 Michigan Consumer Sentiment Is Down From Last Month, But Still Up

by Doug Short, Advisor Perspectives/dshort.com The University of Michigan Consumer Sentiment final number for April came in at 76.4, a welcome improvement over the preliminary reading of 72.3, but below the March final of 78.6. The Briefing.com consensus was for … Continue reading

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Making The Case Against Austerity

by Stephanie Kelton This article was originally published in New Economic Perspectives Neil Irwin at Wonkblog has a new post up:  The Deficit is Falling Fast. Can Washington Accept Victory? He quotes John Makin of the American Enterprise Institute, who says, … Continue reading

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Is the Federal Reserve Breeding the Next Financial Crisis?

by Ambrogio Cesa-Bianchi and Alessandro Rebucci This article was originally published in Voxeu.org Many economists think that the US Federal Reserve’s loose monetary stance in the 2000′s fueled the US housing bubble. Is the Fed thus responsible for the Global … Continue reading

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Reinhart. Rogoff. Wrong.

by Dirk Ehnts, Econoblog101 This is a major scandal of economists finding a result which does not hold under closer scrutiny. Back in 2010, which is just the year that European austerity policies were put into place, the authors published … Continue reading

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