Analysis Topic: Economic Trends Analysis
The analysis published under this topic are as follows.
Tuesday, September 04, 2012
Central Bankers Fail to Understand Forces Holding Back the Economy / Economics / Central Banks
By: Mike_Shedlock
Central bankers Debating the Limits of Power in Jackson Hole are wondering what's holding back the economy.
Read full article... Read full article..."What is holding the economy back? Why is it that we've had such incredibly accommodative monetary policy for so long (but) we've had so little growth? I think it remains a puzzle," said Donald Kohn, who is now a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution think tank in Washington.
Sunday, September 02, 2012
The U.S. Consumer Has In Fact Changed / Economics / US Economy
By: Tony_Pallotta
The consumer represents 70% of total economic output. So as the bond market is to the capital market, so is the consumer to the economy. When the consumer sneezes, the economy catches more than just a cold.
Since the "end" of the 2008 recession something very interesting has happened to the US economy. The US consumer has actually changed their spending habits. They have actually started to live more within their means. And that is a very positive sign for a number of reasons both financially and socially.
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Friday, August 31, 2012
Europe Remains the Wildcard in the Global Economy / Economics / Global Economy
By: InvestmentContrarian
George Leong writes: The muted growth in Europe is far-reaching and negatively impacting the global economy…and the evidence for this is mounting.
Six eurozone countries are in a recession, and Germany and France could join in next year.
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Friday, August 31, 2012
U.S. Economies Financial Tectonic Plates Are Shifting Once Again / Economics / US Economy
By: EWI
History books call the period after the War of 1812 "The Era of Good Feelings."
America was a young nation that had a sense of purpose. National political strife was at a minimum; optimism was in the air.
Major advances in technology and engineering brought the country turnpikes for easier travel and "The Canal Craze" for more efficient commerce.
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Thursday, August 30, 2012
When Is Fractional-Reserve Banking Inflationary? / Economics / Inflation
By: Michael_S_Rozeff
The takeaway here is that fractional-reserve banking is not inflationary per se. Fractional-reserve banking is inflationary when combined with central banks with unconstrained fiat money powers. The real culprit in inflation is an unconstrained central bank. Since central banks are created or enabled by governments, the real culprit in inflation is government. In turn, inflation cannot be controlled unless proper government, which really means proper law, is instituted and respected.
Thursday, August 30, 2012
U.S. 2012:Q2 GDP Growth Upward Revision Reflects Stronger Final Sales / Economics / US Economy
By: Asha_Bangalore
The real gross domestic product of the US economy grew at annual rate of 1.7% in the second quarter, slightly higher than the original estimate of a 1.5% increase. Stronger growth in consumer spending, a smaller trade gap, and an upward revision of government outlays more than offset reductions in business investment outlays and residential investment expenditures to result in a higher estimate of GDP for the second quarter. As a result of the revisions, final sales increased at an annual rate of 2.0% in the second quarter, previously reported as a 1.2% gain. (Details of GDP data are available here).
Thursday, August 30, 2012
BEA Revises Estimate of Annualized U.S. GDP Economic Growth to 1.73% / Economics / US Economy
By: CMI
In their first revision to their estimate of the second quarter 2012 GDP, the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) found that the annualized rate of U.S. domestic economic growth was 1.73%, up 0.19% from their initial estimate -- but still down about a quarter of a percent from the 1.97% reported for the prior quarter and down over two and a quarter percent from the 4.10% growth rate for the 4th quarter of 2011. The changes in the GDP growth shown in this report do not represent actual month-to-month changes in the economy, but merely a refined understanding of the previously reported data for the second quarter.
Wednesday, August 29, 2012
Nazi Economics, a Lesson from History / Economics / Economic Theory
By: Bill_Bonner
Adam Tooze, a British historian, has written a marvelous book on the Nazi economy, The Wages of Destruction. He shows that, far from illustrating the success of intelligent central planning, the German economy of the Third Reich was a disaster. The National Socialists – or “Nazis” – had their plans for Germany. They were determined to put them into practice, regardless of what the Germans may have wanted for themselves. They fiddled with one sector after another.
Tuesday, August 28, 2012
Australia Running Out of Luck, Economy Leveraged to Slowing China / Economics / Austrailia
By: John_Mauldin
While it is summer in the Northern Hemisphere, it is winter "down under." Today we turn our attention to Australia. In Endgame, Jonathan Tepper and I devoted a full chapter to talking about the problems we saw looming in Australia, and for that we have taken some heat! What's not to like about the Land of Oz? In our view, it might be the bubbles that are building. I asked Jonathan to update us on Australia, and in today's Outside the Box he gives us an in-depth look. Let me quote from a point near the end, in case you might decide to look just at the summary:
Monday, August 27, 2012
The Silent Economic Depression / Economics / Great Depression II
By: Gordon_T_Long
John Rubino and Gordon T Long recount their summer vacation experiences with old friends and how significantly things have changed in their friends lives across America. Both came away unsettled about what they heard and how we are now unquestionably in the midst a Silent Depression. Major changes are occurring below the surface of mainstream media coverage that only honest discussions with close friends discloses.
Monday, August 27, 2012
America: The Land of Debt / Economics / US Debt
By: InvestmentContrarian
Traders and the media are focused on the debt distress in Spain, as the country is hindered by a national debt of around 712 billion euros, or about US$892 billion, which breaks down to US$19,391 per citizen. This is why Spain is seriously concerned about the 10-year bond yield at close to seven percent. Paying these high financing costs, trying to cut its national debt and manage its budget will not be easy. The reality is that the eurozone and Europe are in a serious financial crisis.
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Saturday, August 25, 2012
The Day of Economic Reckoning Is Near / Economics / Great Depression II
By: The_Gold_Report
It is a deal with the devil: Governments churn out more and more cash for the promise of continued prosperity. But the day of reckoning is near, according to Doug Casey, chairman of Casey Research and an expert on crisis investing. As the epic battle between inflation and deflation continues on, Casey discusses his predictions for the new world market in this exclusive interview with The Gold Report.
The Gold Report: There will be a Casey Research Summit on "Navigating the Politicized Economy" in Carlsbad, Calif., in September. The thesis behind the summit is that governments have made a Faustian bargain, a pact with the devil, that saves the empire with overspending, but drives it to the brink of collapse by creating fiat currencies. Doug, where in that story is the economy currently?
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Friday, August 24, 2012
Professor Bernanke’s Terrifying Blindness on the Great Depression / Economics / Economic Depression
By: Michael_S_Rozeff
With all his scholarly study of the Great Depression, Prof. Bernanke is blind to several truly major factors that caused the Great Depression. His is a blindness that he shares with very many other economists of this day and age. Their condition can be described as "a certain state of mind" that they share that prevents them from seeking out, seeing and saying what is before their eyes. And what is this state of mind? It is to defend the status quo and to stay within the comfortable bounds of conventional beliefs that support the system as it is. This spares them from confronting other institutions and their own.
Thursday, August 23, 2012
Is Germany Entering a Recession? / Economics / Germany
By: John_Mauldin
Even in August, while nearly all of Europe is on vacation, we find that economies don't get to take vacation. Europe will come back from its holiday and find that nothing has improved and some things have gotten worse. Specifically, Germany looks to be rolling over into recession. In this week's Outside the Box, Charles Gave of GaveKal looks at Deutschland and notes that while it might be able to handle a mild recession, problems will be that much worse in the rest of Europe, which needs a robust German consumer. This letter will print long due to a number of charts.
"While Europe's biggest economy should be able to endure this loss of altitude, the reverberation across Europe will be significant. The absence of exchange rate volatility over the last 15 years has allowed economies such as Italy and France to escape depression-type conditions, which might otherwise have occurred given their economic underpinnings.
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Friday, August 17, 2012
Economic Collapse, We Still Don’t Get It / Economics / Great Depression II
By: Andy_Sutton
As the world collectively muddles through 2012, it is has become increasingly apparent that we still don’t get it. Even after the collapse of 2008 and the completely fabricated and bogus ‘recovery’ that the lapdog presscorps still insists is ongoing, plus the various financial and economic ‘accidents’ that have happened along the way since, such as MFGlobal and PFGBest, plus the annexing of entire countries by the banking syndicate (Greece and Italy for starters), we still don’t get it. We are Rome. Obsessed with bread and circuses such as government handout programs and the Olympics and NASCAR, we’ve taken all that is abhorred by productive societies and made a center stage spectacle of it.
Friday, August 17, 2012
U.S. Jobless Claims Analysis / Economics / US Housing
By: Asha_Bangalore
Initial jobless claims rose slightly (+2,000) to 366,000 during the week ended August 11. Distortions from summer auto plant shutdowns are in the past now, with the level of initial jobless claims now standing close to the levels posted in the early part of the year.
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Wednesday, August 15, 2012
Mind the Theory / Economics / Economic Theory
By: Thorsten_Polleit
The saying that things may work nicely in theory, but do not necessarily work in practice is well known.[1] It is typically meant to disparage the importance of theory, suggesting it would be too far removed from practical matters to help in solving the issue at hand.
The Prussian philosopher Immanuel Kant (1724–1804), in his 1793 essay "On the Popular Judgment: 'This May Be True in Theory, But It Does Not Apply in Practice,'" responded to such criticism; in fact, he responded with his essay to criticism leveled against his ethical theory by the philosopher Christian Garve (1742–1798).
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Tuesday, August 14, 2012
UK CPI Inflation Rise Surprises Mainstream Press, Illustrates Olympics Lasting Debt Legacy / Economics / Inflation
By: Nadeem_Walayat
Mervyn King, the Governor of the Bank of England recently forecast that UK inflation would continue falling for the rest of this year which the mainstream press and academic economists / vested interests had been busy regurgitating at length. That is until today's release of the latest Inflation data for July that showed CPI Inflation rise to 2.6% (2.4%) and RPI to 3.2% (2.8%), which led to confusion across the air-waves as illustrated by the BBC's Stephanie Flanders floundering all over the place in an attempt to explain why Inflation had risen when the script everyone had been following was for Inflation to fall towards 2%.
Monday, August 13, 2012
Post Olympic Recession Depression / Economics / UK Economy
By: Jan_Skoyles
Yesterday the London 2012 Olympics ended with a spectacular finish, leaving the UK proud to have pulled off such a historical event. Across the globe the world’s media have sung our praises on the success of such a great 16 days.
The London Olympics was just one of a handful of events which the UK, particularly London, has been preparing for, for a good while now. Its completion signifies what I suspect will be a speedy fall back to earth for British citizens who have had party after party to look forward to for many years.
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Monday, August 13, 2012
U.S. Economic Facts and Consequences of Growth in Government Jobs vs. Private Jobs vs. Population Growth / Economics / US Economy
By: Mike_Shedlock
Keynesian clowns are concerned about the decline in government jobs in the past few years. They want the government to step up spending and hire more workers to make up for the loss of jobs in the private sector.
Here is a chart from reader Tim Wallace that will help put the recent loss of government jobs in a better perspective.