Analysis Topic: Economic Trends Analysis
The analysis published under this topic are as follows.
Friday, August 19, 2016
Big Policies, Bigger Failures / Economics / Economic Theory
By: Peter_Schiff
Economics is far simpler than most in academics or government would have you believe. To make accurate predictions all you really need is an honest appreciation of the self-interest that is at the heart of free market transactions and an ability to understand how regulations that attempt to "correct" these realities don't work. This is certainly the case with the completely predictable slow-motion train wrecks that are the signature U.S. domestic policy experiments of the last eight years: Obamacare and Federal Reserve stimulus. From the start, I issued countless commentaries on why both would fail spectacularly. The jury has started to come back on Obamacare, and the results are a disaster. And while the verdict on the Fed's policies has yet to arrive in similarly stark terms, I believe that its failure is just as certain.
Friday, August 19, 2016
Deglobalization Already Underway — 4 Technologies That Will Speed It Up / Economics / Global Economy
By: John_Mauldin
BY PATRICK WATSON : If we had to describe the last 50 years of economic history in one word, globalization would be high on the list. Thousands of small, independent economies around the world fused into one nearly seamless whole.
The things we use every day—food, clothing, vehicles, furniture, electronic devices, even the materials that compose our homes—now come from far and wide. We don’t even notice. International trade over vast distances is now so normal that we forget it wasn’t always the case.
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Thursday, August 18, 2016
These 6 Charts Show Why the Average American Is Fed Up / Economics / US Economy
By: John_Mauldin
BY JOHN MAULDIN writes: The last 20 years have brought great wealth to a few while most of the population was lucky to break even.
Whether you’re a member of the elite/protected class or one of the unprotected, it’s hard to deny this reality.
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Wednesday, August 17, 2016
Welcome to the 3-D Economy / Economics / Global Economy
By: John_Mauldin
BY PATRICK WATSON : Eight years after the Fed went bananas by setting interest rates near zero, the weirdness still hasn’t stopped. In fact, the weird part is how unsurprised we are at the bizarre economic news that comes out every day.
Just one example: Almost half the western world’s outstanding sovereign debt—$12.6 trillion worth—traded at negative yields last week, according to the Financial Times. Investors are buying a guaranteed loss with every trade. Still, they can’t get enough.
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Monday, August 15, 2016
Job Seekers Sacrificed to the Inflation Gods / Economics / Inflation
By: Michael_Pento
Our Federal Reserve is composed of labor market economists who place their faith in the theory that inflation is spawned from too many people working. They believe there is a trade-off between employment and prices, where price stability and full employment cannot exist peacefully together the same time.
Given this view, the Fed’s maximum employment and stable inflation mandates are played as a zero-sum game--the lower the unemployment rate the higher the rate of inflation. Therefore, they set about to fulfill this task of low inflation as though it were a sort of Ancient Mayan sacrificial system: ceremonially counting how many job seekers need to be sacrificed on the altar of labor slack to placate the inflation gods.
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Monday, August 15, 2016
Globalization 2.0 Is Coming to an End / Economics / Global Economy
By: John_Mauldin
I’m not the only free trader who is having second thoughts. Stephen Roach, formerly chief economist at Morgan Stanley, wrote:
Recent trends in global trade are also flashing warning signs. According to the International Monetary Fund, annual growth in the volume of world trade has averaged just 3% over the 2009–2016 period—half the 6% rate from 1980 to 2008. This trend reflects not only the Great Recession, but also an unusually anemic recovery. With world trade shifting to a decidedly lower trajectory, political resistance to globalization has only intensified.
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Monday, August 15, 2016
Why Protectionism Won’t Save Unskilled Labor / Economics / Employment
By: John_Mauldin
I just read a policy paper from the German Marshall Fund of the United States. It defends the present trade model. The authors do a good job, but in the process, they describe the problem.
Take a look at this part. (I bolded a few key points.)
The global economy is no longer about making a product in one country, and shipping and selling it somewhere else. It is about complex supply chains that weave together activities all over the globe, supported by investment, technology, and skills that know no borders.
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Saturday, August 13, 2016
Central Banks Are Choking Productivity / Economics / Central Banks
By: Peter_Schiff
If the Economy were a car, productivity would be the engine. Heated seats, on-demand 4-wheel drive and light-sensitive tinted windshields, are all very nice. But they mean little if the engine doesn't turn and the car just sits in the driveway. The latest productivity data from the Commerce Department confirms that our economic engine is sputtering.
If you strip away all the bells and whistles of economic analysis, the simple truth is that the increased living standards that have taken us from the stone age to the digital age happened because we increased our productivity. Better plows, windmills, bulldozers, factories and, more recently, better software, technology and automation, have allowed economies to produce more output with less human effort. This means there are more goods and services for more people to share and workers can work less to acquire those goodies. When productivity stops increasing, no amount of financial gimmickry can compensate.
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Friday, August 12, 2016
How the Frankfurt School Changed American Culture / Economics / Economic Theory
By: David_Galland
Dear Parade-Goer,
How many times have you heard someone lament how much the world has changed from the good old days? You know, the simpler pre-PC period when the world operated according to fairly predictable principles.
But then we woke one day in a world with every bastion of what some might called normalcy under attack. Institutions that 100 years ago appeared unassailable—marriage, for example—are increasingly seen as antiquated. Even the idea of a national character is viewed as wrong-minded and, in the successful societies of the West, as exclusionary and even racist.
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Wednesday, August 10, 2016
Globalization Is Dead, But The Idea Is Not / Economics / Global Economy
By: Raul_I_Meijer
We can, every single one of us, agree that we’re either in or just past a -financial- crisis. But that seems to be all we can agree on. Because some call it the GFC, others a recession, and still others a depression. And some insist on seeing it as ‘in the past’, and solved, while others see it as a continuing issue.
I personally have the idea that if you think central banks -and perhaps governments- have the ability and the tools to prevent or cure financial crises, you’re in the more optimistic camp. And if you don’t, you’re a pessimist. A third option might be to think that no matter what central bankers do, things will solve themselves, but I don’t see much of that being floated. Not anymore.
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Wednesday, August 10, 2016
3 Recent Danger Signs of a Looming Recession / Economics / Recession 2016
By: John_Mauldin
BY TONY SAGAMI : The world of investing is much riskier today than when I was growing up.
The biggest risk I see is an economy that is barely expanding beyond stall speed and threatening to fall into a recession.
The Census Bureau recently reported that the US economy grew at a 1.2% annualized pace in Q2. Plus, they adjusted the Q1 GDP growth rate from 1.1% down to just 0.8%.
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Tuesday, August 09, 2016
Greenspan Gets One Right: Here Comes Stagflation / Economics / Stagflation
By: Michael_Pento
In a recent interview, former U.S. Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan (the "Maestro") warned that the economy was experiencing, "the early signs of stagflation." This is a very rare occasion where Mr. Greenspan and I are actually in agreement. I also warned of this in my “Time to Invest for Stagflation” commentary published several months ago.
In fact, the U.S. economy—and indeed the entire developed world—is in the beginning stages of an unprecedented breakout of stagflation. The number one reason for this can be summed up in a single word…debt. Debt not only steers an economy towards low growth but it also mires the nation with inflation.
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Monday, August 01, 2016
US Economy - 3 Charts Economists Want to Keep Secret / Economics / US Economy
By: EWI
Despite new all-time highs in the stock market, US economic data is lagging. In fact, real GDP per person just dropped to its lowest level in more than 75 years!
While major news outlets never miss a chance to jump on that latest negative trend from society, they seem reluctant to cover basic economic figures that could spell bad news for millions of Americans. Yet the steady dive in US economic performance has recently become too pronounced to ignore.
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Friday, July 29, 2016
US GDP Forecast Sinks to 1.8% Following Advance Economic Indicators Reports / Economics / US Economy
By: Mike_Shedlock
Today the Census Department released its first "Advance Economic Indicators Report". The new report adds wholesale and retail inventories to its existing International Trade in Goods report.
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Thursday, July 28, 2016
The State Of The Economy / Economics / US Housing
By: .....
If the economy was a game of bingo, we'd all be waiting for the 75 ball to get pulled. Things are going well - in some areas, at least - and it looks like things will continue to improve. Unfortunately, it also seems like we can't quite get back to that pre-2008 level of prosperity that we left so long ago. Something seems to be missing, and there are disagreements on what that might be. Waiting for that proverbial ball to get pulled is difficult, but it helps to know what to be on the lookout for. As always, though, there are multiple possibilities.
Wednesday, July 20, 2016
China Economic Troubles - Is Kyle Bass Finally Getting His Revenge? / Economics / China Economy
By: Clif_Droke
One of America's most prominent hedge fund managers is betting the farm that China's economic troubles are far from over. His bet centers around the U.S. dollar and by extension several Asian currencies. What happens to the dollar from here will determine whether this man's epic trading positions pays off, and China suffers a major setback, and whether his worst case scenario for the global economic outlook is merely a mirage. If he's right, the outcome of his bet will also affect the commodities market and perhaps even the equities market.
Tuesday, July 19, 2016
Deleveraging in Motion - Believe It or Not, Our Money Velocity Sucks! / Economics / Deflation
By: Harry_Dent
Dr. Lacy Hunt has been featured more than any outside speaker at our IES conferences. Why? Because he’s the only classical economist I fully admire and he is a successful bond investment manager in the real world that understands the trend towards deflation, despite unprecedented money-printing.I love the gold bugs for being realistic and honest about the debt and financial asset bubble we’re in, especially when most mainstream economists and analysts are blind to it.
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Saturday, July 16, 2016
Ireland’s Bogus 26% GDP Economic Boost / Economics / Economic Statistics
By: MISES
Jonathan Newman writes: Ireland’s Central Statistics Office updated their 2015 national income figures and revealed a staggering 26.3% increase in real GDP from 2014 to 2015.
Paul Krugman called it “leprechaun economics.”
Joseph Salerno said “that’s unbelievable!”
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Monday, July 11, 2016
What US Economic Recovery; 62% of Americans Don't Even Have $1000 in Savings / Economics / US Economy
By: Sol_Palha
A key sign of financial health is savings; if one does not have a decent amount of money tucked away for a rainy day, it is a sign that all is not well. Americans have a very hard time sticking to a budget and saving, compared to their Asian counterparts. This is reflected in the startling revelation that over 62% of Americans do not even have $1000 in their savings account. Foreigners are shocked when they find out that Americans have so little money saved for a rainy day.
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Tuesday, July 05, 2016
Ready or Not the Recession May Have Already Arrived / Economics / Recession 2016
By: Michael_Pento
While investors have been focused on the perennial failed hope for a second half economic recovery, they have been missing the most salient point: the U.S. most likely entered into a recession at the end of last quarter.
That’s right, when adjusting nominal GDP growth for Core Consumer Price Inflation for the average of the past two-quarters the recession is already here. But before we look deeper into this, let’s first look at the following five charts that illustrate the economy has been steadily deteriorating for the past few years and that the pace of decline has recently picked up steam.
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