America's Economic Future – A Discussion By Ted Kavadas
As a follow-up to yesterday’s post, here is a passage from Larry Summers’ March 13, 2009 speech that speaks of the importance of economic strength in achieving broader societal goals: “Our single most important priority is bringing about economic recovery and ensuring that the next economic expansion, unlike it’s predecessors, is fundamentally sound and not …
One aspect of our current period of economic weakness that lacks broad recognition is the impact on society. There are many different aspects of this societal impact, some of which I have already discussed on this blog. Yesterday’s Wall Street Journal, page A3 had stories that serve as examples of this societal impact of economic …
I have made various comments about Gold over the last few months. One aspect during Gold’s price increase that I have noted as disconcerting is the relative lagging performance of the Gold stocks. I use the HUI index as a proxy for Gold stocks. As one can see on the daily chart below, the Gold …
Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner was on “This Week” on Sunday and made various comments. Here is the link: http://abcnews.go.com/ThisWeek/week-transcript-treasury-secretary-timothy-geithner/story?id=9758951 I could make a lot of comments regarding this interview. However, I would like to focus on this one exchange: TAPPER: The Congress just voted to raise the debt ceiling to more than $14 trillion dollars. …
An article in yesterday’s Wall Street Journal presents a thorough summary of the situation at Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. The article is titled, “No Exit in Sight for U.S. As Fannie, Freddie Flail.” Here is the link to the story: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704362004575001042824028862.html?KEYWORDS=no+exit+in+sight+for+us I’ve commented extensively on the U.S. real estate situation, and the national attempts …
Two measures of economic activity that I closely follow have been weak over the recent past months. This is notable, as they did enjoy a significant “boost” over the mid-2009 timeframe. These two measures have proven to be excellent indicators in the past. They would be considered “coincident” in nature. I view the weakness of …
Here are two charts from the Minneapolis Fed site: http://www.minneapolisfed.org/publications_papers/studies/recession_perspective/index.cfm They show, from a historical context, how declines in employment and output during this period of economic weakness (which FRB Minneapolis refers to as a recession) compare to those of previous recessions. First, the employment chart. Here are two notes regarding this chart: 1. Employment …
With the recent unveiling of the proposed FY2011 budget, I would like to make a few comments with regard to budget deficits and federal expenditures. Here is a historical chart of federal expenditures. This chart is from the St. Louis Federal Reserve website. This chart helps one put rising government expenditures in a historical context: …
I found some interesting comments in the SIGTARP January 30 2010 Report to Congress: http://www.sigtarp.gov/reports/congress/2010/January2010_Quarterly_Report_to_Congress.pdf From the Executive Summary, which begins on Page 5: “Many of TARP’s stated goals, however, have simply not been met. Despite the fact that the explicit goal of the Capital Purchase Program (“CPP”) was to increase financing to U.S. businesses and consumers, …
I find a periodic review of Gold’s price relative to the Dow Jones Industrials’ and to Crude Oil’s interesting. Below is a long-term monthly chart of the Dow Jones Industrial Average price relative to that of Gold’s. As one can see, Gold has been outperforming since roughly 2001, after underperforming from roughly 1981-2000: chart courtesy …