July 2 Gallup Poll Results On Economic Confidence – Notable Excerpts

On July 2, Gallup released the poll results titled “U.S. Economic Confidence Holds Near Five-Year High in June.”  The subtitle is “Gallup’s Economic Confidence Index is -8 for June, similar to -7 in May.” Notable excerpts include: Americans’ confidence in the economy held steady in June, despite U.S. stock prices registering a monthly decline for the …

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Recession Measures – Updated

This post is the latest update to a series of blog posts seen on the CalculatedRisk.com blog.  The original blog post of April 12, 2010, is titled “Recession Measures.” In it, Bill discussed key measures that the NBER uses to determine recoveries, and posted four charts. Here are those charts, updated in his July 1, 2013 post titled “Update: …

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Disturbing Charts (Update 11)

I find the following charts to be disturbing.   These charts would be disturbing at any point in the economic cycle; that they (on average) depict such a tenuous situation now – 49 months after the official (as per the 9-20-10 NBER announcement) June 2009 end of the recession – is especially notable. These charts raise …

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Consumer Confidence Surveys – As Of June 27, 2013

Doug Short had a blog post of June 25 (“Consumer Confidence Beats Expectations, Highest Since January 2008“) in which he presents the latest Conference Board Consumer Confidence and Thomson/Reuters University of Michigan Consumer Sentiment Index charts.  They are presented below: (click on charts to enlarge images) – – There are a few aspects of the above …

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Durable Goods New Orders – Long-Term Charts Through May 2013

Many people place emphasis on Durable Goods New Orders as a prominent economic indicator and/or leading economic indicator. For reference, below are charts depicting this measure. First, from the St. Louis Fed site (FRED), a chart through May, last updated on June 25.  This value is 231,030 ($ Millions) : (click on charts to enlarge …

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Current Economic Situation

With regard to our current economic situation,  my thoughts can best be described/summarized by the posts found under the 25 “Building Financial Danger” posts. My thoughts concerning our ongoing economic situation – with future implications – can be seen on the page titled “A Special Note On Our Economic Situation,” which has been found near …

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Markets During Periods Of Federal Reserve Intervention – June 20, 2013 Update

In the August 9, 2011 post (“QE3 – Various Thoughts“) I posted a chart that depicted the movements of the S&P500, 10-Year Treasury Yield and the Fed Funds rate spanning the periods of various Federal Reserve interventions since 2007. For reference purposes, here is an updated chart from Doug Short’s blog post of June 20 …

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The Prospect Of Deflation

Deflation and the potential for such a condition to develop is currently a topic of paramount importance, for a variety of reasons.  [note: to clarify, for purposes of this discussion, when I mention “deflation” I am referring to the CPI going below zero.] As one can see in the various professional economic forecasts mentioned in this …

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Average Hourly Earnings Trends

I have written many blog posts concerning the worrisome trends in income and earnings. Along these lines, one of the measures showing disconcerting trends is that of hourly earnings. While the concept of hourly earnings can be defined and measured in a variety of ways, below are a few charts that I believe broadly illustrate problematic …

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