Apr. Trade Balance: -$50.1B vs. -$49.3B expected and -$52.6B (revised) prior. Exports $182.9B....

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Bear Bait Comments (591)
 
Austerity the silent killer of American economy. Everyone talks about contagion; but , the fact Europe isn't buying American goods (to austere people and countries) could be worse than the effects of the debt crisis. It just happens more slowly and with less fanfare.
8 Jun 2012, 09:30 AM Reply Like

joro_ianev Comments (305)
 
Bear Bait:

You are mistaken in your belief. Austerity, as practiced in Europe and the US, goes hand-in-hand with higher debt. Although the word evokes thought of 'spending cuts', what is actually happening is continued government spending and higher taxes. This wrong form of austerity is what is killing the private sector and leading to drastic contraction.
8 Jun 2012, 11:57 AM Reply Like

brachiosaurus Comments (232)
 
government spending is down significantly in at least Spain and Ireland. Austerity is austerity and in all its forms it kills the private sector at times like this.
9 Jun 2012, 09:52 AM Reply Like

CautiousInvestor Comments (2779)
 
The increase in the trade deficit can be attributed to broadly slowing global growth, not just slowing growth inside the EMU. As long as many European economies are inflicted by corruption, union influence, systemic tax evasion and heavily controlled labor markets there are no viable economic policies; the economies are somewhere between broken and dysfunctional. Growth policies will work no better than austerity.
8 Jun 2012, 12:20 PM Reply Like

montanamark Comments (1359)
 
well said
8 Jun 2012, 07:02 PM Reply Like

Geoffrey Harris Comments (794)
 
So where do folks seeing the market indices going from here. For the last couple of weeks the S&P 500, for example, has been stuck in the 1267 - 1335 range.
8 Jun 2012, 09:29 PM Reply Like