The Good News Economist

Are Things As Bad as They Seem?

Steve,

I really enjoyed the storm analogy.

Way back I used to work for the National Weather Service. It continues to be an interesting exercise to see forecasters vary so widely on their predictions... particularly when the forecast moves beyond a few days...

Hurricanes especially have a "mind of their own". Statisticians pore over the vast amounts of data produced by one storm in the hopes of predicting the path of the next one more accurately... and still the predicted path is wide.

Many times it come down to which forecast model to you put your trust in and what data was used to load its run.

I appreciated also the compilation of indicators. What is your read on ISM report on manufacturing? It appears that while many of the indexes there still point to contraction, many of them for January point to contraction at a significantly reduced rate...
mast-economy.blogspot....

GNE

What was Buffett Doing in 1974? How About in 2008?

mkreisel,

I debated about putting that quote in the original article. Cut and pasted it back in and out several times.

thanks for adding it here!

GNE

Blogroll of 10 Affirmative Prognosticators for 2009

Thanks for reading H,

But if you remember my post several weeks ago...

Because history continues to tell us that when it comes to macro economics, "the majority is always wrong."

mast-economy.blogspot....

My bet would be somewhere 20 bucks plus or minus the consensus. (Until of course we get a few weeks out... and then a few days out the consensus is more indicative)

GNE