More on Q4 GDP: Defense spending falls 22% - the biggest drop in 40 years - leading real federal spending -15%. State/local spending -0.7%. Personal consumption expenditures +2.2% vs. 1.6% in Q3. Nonresidential fixed investment +8.4% vs. +1.8%. Stock futures dipped and then bounced on the soft print. as traders look at calendars and realize we're halfway to 2013 Q2. (full report) [View news story]
More on Q4 GDP: Defense spending falls 22% - the biggest drop in 40 years - leading real federal spending -15%. State/local spending -0.7%. Personal consumption expenditures +2.2% vs. 1.6% in Q3. Nonresidential fixed investment +8.4% vs. +1.8%. Stock futures dipped and then bounced on the soft print. as traders look at calendars and realize we're halfway to 2013 Q2. (full report) [View news story]
Virtually every dollar spent on defense ultimately flows to people (including engineering, manufacturing, technology jobs). We've outsourced most of the rest of those jobs. We apparently don't need defense, or protection of US interests oversees anymore (more jobs). So I guess we need to retrain our engineers and technicians and artisans to just do things that make us feel happy.
A high level of uncertainty coupled with a raft of weak economic data is prompting many economists to begin ratcheting down their growth estimates for the second half. From manufacturing to job growth to consumer spending, it's been disappointing, and projections for the April-June period are increasingly coming in lower - around a 1.5% annual pace - versus 1.9% in the first quarter. [View news story]
But the ADP jobs report was great! How could it be?
The Fed's 'Twist' And The U.S. Economic Outlook [View article]
Automated manufacturing only makes us competitive if we eliminate most of the labor from our manufacturing costs!
Unfortunately our best way forward long term in manufacturing is to let the free market pressure our labor unit costs down into a more competitive range.
It may be Sunday but there will again be no rest for the wicked as Republicans and Democrats struggle to forge a debt-limit deal before Asian markets open for Monday's trading. Investors have been sanguine so far, but with talks continuing to fail, firms are starting to stockpile cash. [View news story]
I think they are going to end up with something semi-clean and short-term.
They need to satisfy the capital markets for now. Then they need to accept that the rest of the world is reducing spending, and the rating agencies are going to demand that we do too.
Nothing says we can't buy ourselves more time to figure out how to get to a consensus.
Emails from energy executives, industry lawyers, state geologists and analysts show skepticism about the profitability of gas drilling from deep underground shales. “The word...is that the shale plays are just giant Ponzi schemes and the economics just do not work,” wrote one analyst in August 2009. [View news story]
Both sides are out there in the media.
Problem is that each news source presents its own bias. None fairly present pros/cons. And most of us just dial-in to the one that reflects our own positions.
The Daily Show? Whether news or comedy... Are you saying it presents conservative viewpoints equally with liberal ones?
Whatever happens with a new consumer financial protection agency, James Surowiecki writes, the bigger part of the reform bill (besides the fact that it's actually done, and actually reforms things) may be resolution authority, which is likely to help prevent the chaos seen around the Lehman Brothers collapse. [View news story]
If the government chooses to exercise all the authority this bill gives it, there could be a lot less chaos. Less profits, less jobs, less chaos..
The U.S. government says it would immediately issue a new ban on deepwater drilling if it loses an appeal set for today, setting the stage for a fight that could go to the Supreme Court. [View news story]
There is no closet. This is a socialist administration.
No, it's not 1932, Amity Shlaes agrees, but there are some troubling similarities: instability in the international currency arrangement, the lack of commitment to boost trade, and - most important and most eerily mindful of 1932 - imminent tax increases. [View news story]
WPA activities funded by taxes and debt suck the life out of the private sector. If some of those wasted funds get recycled through wages back into the bottom of the food chain, then some of it gets back into the economy, but isn't reinserted in a place that causes any growth, or any real jobs. I'm imagining a great flushing sound!
More on Q4 GDP: Defense spending falls 22% - the biggest drop in 40 years - leading real federal spending -15%. State/local spending -0.7%. Personal consumption expenditures +2.2% vs. 1.6% in Q3. Nonresidential fixed investment +8.4% vs. +1.8%. Stock futures dipped and then bounced on the soft print. as traders look at calendars and realize we're halfway to 2013 Q2. (full report) [View news story]
More on Q4 GDP: Defense spending falls 22% - the biggest drop in 40 years - leading real federal spending -15%. State/local spending -0.7%. Personal consumption expenditures +2.2% vs. 1.6% in Q3. Nonresidential fixed investment +8.4% vs. +1.8%. Stock futures dipped and then bounced on the soft print. as traders look at calendars and realize we're halfway to 2013 Q2. (full report) [View news story]
We apparently don't need defense, or protection of US interests oversees anymore (more jobs).
So I guess we need to retrain our engineers and technicians and artisans to just do things that make us feel happy.
A high level of uncertainty coupled with a raft of weak economic data is prompting many economists to begin ratcheting down their growth estimates for the second half. From manufacturing to job growth to consumer spending, it's been disappointing, and projections for the April-June period are increasingly coming in lower - around a 1.5% annual pace - versus 1.9% in the first quarter. [View news story]
The Fed's 'Twist' And The U.S. Economic Outlook [View article]
Unfortunately our best way forward long term in manufacturing is to let the free market pressure our labor unit costs down into a more competitive range.
It may be Sunday but there will again be no rest for the wicked as Republicans and Democrats struggle to forge a debt-limit deal before Asian markets open for Monday's trading. Investors have been sanguine so far, but with talks continuing to fail, firms are starting to stockpile cash. [View news story]
They need to satisfy the capital markets for now. Then they need to accept that the rest of the world is reducing spending, and the rating agencies are going to demand that we do too.
Nothing says we can't buy ourselves more time to figure out how to get to a consensus.
Emails from energy executives, industry lawyers, state geologists and analysts show skepticism about the profitability of gas drilling from deep underground shales. “The word...is that the shale plays are just giant Ponzi schemes and the economics just do not work,” wrote one analyst in August 2009. [View news story]
Problem is that each news source presents its own bias. None fairly present pros/cons. And most of us just dial-in to the one that reflects our own positions.
The Daily Show? Whether news or comedy... Are you saying it presents conservative viewpoints equally with liberal ones?
Whatever happens with a new consumer financial protection agency, James Surowiecki writes, the bigger part of the reform bill (besides the fact that it's actually done, and actually reforms things) may be resolution authority, which is likely to help prevent the chaos seen around the Lehman Brothers collapse. [View news story]
The U.S. government says it would immediately issue a new ban on deepwater drilling if it loses an appeal set for today, setting the stage for a fight that could go to the Supreme Court. [View news story]
No, it's not 1932, Amity Shlaes agrees, but there are some troubling similarities: instability in the international currency arrangement, the lack of commitment to boost trade, and - most important and most eerily mindful of 1932 - imminent tax increases. [View news story]