As I read an article in the Financial Times - Downturn Slows Tide of U.S. Bound Workers - I could not help but appreciate the significance of declining border traffic between the U.S. and Mexico and then it also dawned on me that this source of data is probably as close as one may get to a reliable unmanipulated economic indicator.
It is estimated that the combined GDP ouputs for California and Texas would easily rank them amongst the top five global economies and it is common knowledge that our southern neighbor supplies America with plenty of competitively priced labor. Hmmh…
Below is an excerpt of the story from the Financial Times:
Rosalia Martinez is taking a break. A Mexico-born legal resident of the US, she and her friends live in Tijuana and cross the border into California every day to help travellers carry their bags.
It is tiring work, made worse by the searing midday heat, so Ms Martinez has found a step in the shade on which to sit. Fanning herself with a magazine, she says she has noticed an increase in the number of Mexicans coming home from the US.
“A lot of people I’m helping here at the border are Mexican,” she says. “But they are coming back into Mexico because there is no work for them in California."
Gentle readers, when the land of milk and honey ceases to flow with naught but sour milk and bitterness, then times are really tough and one does not need a high profile media market cheerleader or a "fancy-schmancy white shoe" Wall Street banker to argue otherwise. Common sense from the common man supplants their Byzantine analysis.
Disclosures: Hillbent.com, Inc. or its affiliates may own positions in the equities mentioned in our reports. We do not receive any compensation from any of the companies covered in our reports.
