America's Economic Future – A Discussion By Ted Kavadas
The January Wall Street Journal Economic Forecast Survey was published January 14, 2011. The headline is “Economists Optimistic On Growth.” I found a variety of topics seen in the Q&A (spreadsheet tab) to be interesting, including questions on “Grading Central Bankers” and “QE2”. The current average forecasts among economists polled include the following: GDP: full-year …
As a continuation of the last post, here are three other charts that I find disturbing in nature. These charts raise a lot of questions. Many of these questions I have discussed in the blog, as I believe they are very significant in nature. Additionally, these charts should highlight the “atypical” nature of our economic …
In the next two posts, I am going to display various charts that I find disturbing. These charts would be disturbing at any point in the economic cycle; that they depict such a tenuous situation now – 18 months after the official (as per the 9-20-10 NBER announcement) June 2009 end of the recession – …
The December NFIB Small Business Optimism was released January 11. The headline of the Press Release is “NFIB Small Business Optimism Index Remains Weak.” The Press Release contains a variety of statistics. One excerpt from the Press Release that I found especially notable was: “Weak sales remains the top problem, stagnating hiring and spending on …
As I have commented previously, as in the October 6, 2009 post, in my opinion the official methodologies used to measure the various job loss and unemployment statistics do not provide an accurate depiction; they serve to understate the severity of unemployment. However, even if one chooses to look at the official statistics, the following …
On May 3, 2010 I wrote a post concerning the notable divergence that had occurred between the S&P500 and Chinese (Shanghai Composite) stock markets. Since that May post, the divergence has grown. The chart below illustrate this divergence; it shows the S&P500 vs. the Shanghai Composite on a daily basis, LOG scale, since 2006: (click …
This post is an update to previous posts concerning food stamps. The program is officially called “Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program,” or SNAP. As stated on the SNAP website, “As of Oct. 1, 2008, Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) is the new name for the federal Food Stamp Program.” The data was last updated December 2, …
On December 14, The Wall Street Journal had a story titled “Fewer Homes ‘Underwater’ as Foreclosures Increase.” In the article, I found a quote by Matt Dobler as especially notable: “It just kind of leaves you wondering what the safety net is for my generation, because it’s obviously not our home.” Although I typically don’t …
On December 22 MacroMarkets released its December Home Price Expectations Survey results. Here is the Press Release (pdf); the accompanying chart is seen below: (click on chart image to enlarge) As one can see from the above chart, the expectation is that not only has the residential real estate market (nearly) hit a “bottom” as …