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Source. HT: Dick Grannis
Wednesday, June 16, 2010
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2010
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June
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- Fiscal and monetary policy are headwinds, not tail...
- No signs of acute distress in the bond market
- Corporate borrowing costs unchanged for five years
- Commercial real estate has taken a huge hit
- The June decline in confidence is nothing to worry...
- Housing prices have been stable for over a year
- Credit spreads are still high, but not scary
- Inflation is still within the Fed's target range
- Chicago Fed Activity Index still strong
- Paragliding in Torrey Pines
- Corporate profits look very strong
- Rising consumer confidence is a good sign
- Financial conditions are not all that terrible
- Weekly claims lower than expected
- The pace of business investment is strong, but the...
- It's about time: austerity is the new fashion in E...
- Fed remains in reactive mode, which is not helpful
- New home sales distorted by incentives
- Strong growth in the hiring of temp workers
- Putting commodity prices into perspective
- Shipping update--looking better and better
- Further evidence the Euro scare is passing
- Housing market continues to stabilize
- Spread update—good news on the margin
- Dollar weakens against the yuan
- Natural gas rebound
- The decline in the Vix and swap spreads looks very...
- Household financial burdens continue to decline, a...
- Another high for gold portends higher commodity pr...
- A weaker dollar reflects good news for the U.S.
- Inflation pressures are building in the production...
- Leading Indicators still point to growth
- A strengthening economy calls for tighter Fed policy
- A story of two spills
- Time and culture
- Producer price inflation update
- U.S. industrial production in a solid recovery
- Housing market is still in a slow but uneven recovery
- Declining swap spreads are very bullish
- As fear subsides, prices rise
- A comment on the ECRI leading indicator
- Swap spreads and implied volatility are subsiding
- Shipping update
- Global industrial recovery continues
- Government jobs are by far the best-paying
- Export activity continues to be strong
- Retail sales remain strong
- Swap spread update: systemic risk is fading
- Federal budget outlook is improving on the margin
- Why households would benefit from higher interest ...
- When you stop paying people who don't work, more p...
- The trade picture looks bright
- Weekly claims make scant progress, but that's not ...
- Dollar update: still somewhat weak
- Chinese export boom
- Systemic risk still high in Europe, but not too ba...
- Commodity prices have not collapsed
- All currencies are weak relative to gold
- Impressive strength in the used car market
- German manufacturing orders look strong
- Federal debt is not even close to 100% of GDP
- The growth rate of private sector jobs is decent
- 1.3 million jobs and counting
- Monster Indices confirm improving labor market con...
- Another growth scare passes
- My personal healthcare rant
- Good news from the service sector overshadowed by ...
- Auto recovery in full bloom
- Corporate layoffs are very low
- Construction spending stops declining
- Manufacturing index shows continued strength and r...
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June
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About Me
Favorite blogs
Favorite books
- "A Random Walk down Wall Street" -Burton Malkiel
- "FDR's Folly" -Jim Powell
- "I Am John Galt" -Don Luskin
- "Panic" -Andrew Redleaf and Richard Vigilante
- "Parliament of Whores" -P.J. O'Rourke
- "Popular Economics" -John Tamny
- "The Education of a Speculator" -Victor Niederhoffer
- "The Financial Crisis and the Free Market Cure" -John Allison
- "The Seven Fat Years" -Robert Bartley
- "The Way the World Works" -Jude Wanniski
- "Wealth and Poverty" -George Gilder
11 comments:
An improvement of this cartoon would be to show, geographically, where the money comes from and then goes--in other words, which states generate the red ink.
The truth is that the Red States are aptly named.
That's a great picture!
True love really is blind. Your boyfriend has added 2.5 trillion to the debt in 500 days. Since Pelosi took over the Congress, annual spending has increased by around a trillion dollars.
The progressive income tax is the main culprit for the geographical disparity. You already know this, hence your conspiracy theory the GOP is really the party of taxing the rich.
I understand your point. However you have likely understated the size of the 'spill' in the gulf.
Those of you who are interested, you may find a map of the spill at:
http://www.cnbc.com/id/36913967
It is virtually in my lap right now.
This is a disturbing cartoon. But then that is all it is... a cartoon. What is happening in the Gulf of Mexico right now is so tragic that it is a kind of travesty to have it minimized in the way that this cartoon does for the goal of scoring political points.
11 PEOPLE LOST THEIR LIVES, entire segments of the economic basis of the people of the Gulf Coast are in dire risk, entire ecosystems will sustain damage that will take decades to recover, and the oil that is gushing into the Gulf is greater than anyone can really grasp, equivalent to an Exxon Valdez-size spill every four days, with the relief wells being very hazardous to perform, and if they fail then this well could spew enormous quantities of oil into the Gulf indefinitely.
You guys are something else, quibbling about your little political ideologies, scoring points with pathetic ad hominem sniping and elitist economic theorizing.
I hold Scott in high regard, which is why I read this blog, so far from my comfort zone, because that is how one learns. John and I would probably agree on little, but I think he has some grasp of what is happening in the real world. Unfortunately, many of you huddle in your right wing echo-chamber which I have discovered is just as effective as the left wing echo-chamber... alas... and will probably continue to do so as the Real World devolves around you. You need to get out more.
Douglas,
Though we may try, we can't all reach your plateau of sophistication and concern.
You are truly an inspiration.
Doug: may I submit that you need to spend more time in the economic and financial world to appreciate the monstrous scale of the deficit that Obama and the Dems are unleashing on the world.
Scott,
I guess that time will tell on all fronts. With some luck the relief wells will hit the target and kill the gusher by September. Then time will tell how bad the damage will actually be. I think I do understand the perilousness of the deficit, but I don't blame it all on the Dems and Obama. It seems that two ill-conceived wars (owned by both parties) didn't help much and both parties have plenty of blood on their hands when it comes to enabling the meltdown we have experienced. A bi-partisan fubar if there ever was one. That's what I mean about political points. And then voices in the economic and financial world are all over the map on the issues of finance and governance. Some authoritative voices agree with you some do not. At any rate that is why I read here, to learn.
Doug: our deficit problem has very little to do with wars. It's mostly the product of a relentless increase in government spending relative to the size of the economy, which in turn is mostly due to an expansion of entitlements. Well over half the budget is consumed by transfer payments. Worse still, entitlement spending is going to increase massively going forward if current law is not changed. Then you have the unfunded liabilities of social security and medicare that are not yet part of the budget and already add up to many trillions of dollars. And of course both parties are complicit in all this, but Obama has now captured the crown for the biggest big spender of all.
How I wish that war spending were our main problem.
Scott, I do not imagine that the wars are our only, or even our biggest problem, but surely if we hadn't been bleeding out billions of dollars a month we would have been in somewhat better position... but I take your point. Sometimes I wonder what the IMF or World Bank would tell us we had to do if we were a Third World Country...
I don't think the political will exists to deal with the long term financial condition of the country any more than it exists to deal with even more fundamental problems of resources and energy. No one on any level wants to hear that the way we have been living our lives is the problem and that we have to restructure our lives to continue in a reasonable fashion.
"Our deficit problem has very little to do with wars."
I find this a puzzling statement.
"According to a Congressional Budget Office (CBO) report published in October 2007, the U.S. wars in Iraq and Afghanistan could cost taxpayers a total of $2.4 trillion dollars by 2017 when counting the huge interest costs because combat is being financed with borrowed money. The CBO estimated that of the $2.4 trillion long-term price tag for the war, about $1.9 trillion of that would be spent on Iraq, or $6,300 per U.S. citizen." Wikipedia.
Of course, since 2007, Obama has directed US troops to go back into Afghanie (costing more billions), even while the situation in Iraq may be worsening.
You know, a trillion here, and a trillion there, and it starts to add up to real money.
If you add up DoD, VA, Homeland Security, Civilian Defense and debt payments from wars you get to $1 trillion a year.
Make no mistake: Wars cost a lot of money, and bulk up the federal deficit. To say they do not is just fantasy.
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