Tag Archives: US EConomics

“A global house-price slump is coming,” The Economist, edited. I find this article to be interesting although I do not agree with much of it. Prices are an issue; but so are interest rates. Much of the costs of housing can also be from house manufacturing waste. I was watching my new home being built. The scrap is horrendous. The do-overs because of a lack of critical path are numerous. Quality is inspected into homes and not built into a home. I...

Q3 GDP: good news for now, bad news for the future  – by New Deal democrat I have to keep this note brief, since I am on the road. As you presumably already know, real GDP was positive for the Third Quarter, up 2.6% at an annual rate: Subject to revisions in the next several months of course, but for the moment, this puts to rest ideas that the US economy was in a recession earlier this year, since the decline was very shallow and not...

Seems that gas, fuel, gasoline is being used as a marker to understand just how horrible we have it as a result of the current inflation. It’s just sooooooooooo terrible. I’ll just say this. As a marker of inflation and our personal economic experience all it shows is how terrible we are at remembering. Unfortunately for us, such a bad memory leads us to terrible voting decisions. Though, it does allow for easy emotional manipulation of the citizenry...

The Treasury yield curve has now almost totally inverted  – by New Deal democrat One of the few leading indicators not flashing red for recession has been the short end of the Treasury yield curve, which has been relentlessly positive – until now. While the 10 year minus 2 year Treasury spread has been negative for months, the 10 year minus 3 month had remained positive. But twice in the last two weeks the 3 month Treasury has yielded more...

The tide has now turned as to house prices Last month I wrote that the FHFA showed evidence that house prices had peaked, and that “since the FHFA has a tendency to turn slightly ahead of the Case Shiller index, this strongly suggests that a sharp deceleration in the Case Shiller index YoY will start within a month or two.”  That was borne out in this morning’s reports for August house prices. The FHFA purchase only index, which is...

When will housing construction turn down? A fuller consideration  – by New Deal democrat No important economic news today. Also I am traveling this week, so there might be some light posting, as in, I might skip a day or two. But I very much want to see what is happening with house prices, which will be updated tomorrow in the FHFA and Case Shiller indexes, and Wednesday as part of the new home sales release. In the meantime, after I posted...

Weekly Indicators for October 17 – 21 at Seeking Alpha My Weekly Indicators post is up at Seeking Alpha. If you thought the long leading indicators couldn’t get any worse – well, they could. As usual, clicking over and reading will bring you up to the virtual moment as to how the economy is doing right now, and how it is likely to perform over the next 12 months+. “New Deal democrat’s Weekly Indicators for October 10 – 14,” Angry Bear...

If GOP Wins Either House Of Congress, Dems Must Kill Debt Ceiling  If it comes to pass and especially if the GOP takes both houses, presumably Democrats will be able to kill the debt ceiling in the lame duck session. This assumes Manchin and Sinema stick with them on it, which one of them might not. As a budget matter, it can pass by reconciliation, which avoids a filibuster. It can also be passed with only 50 votes plus VP Harris in the Senate....

September existing home sales and prices decline  – by New Deal democrat With the exception of their big impact on prices, I do not particularly pay attention to existing home sales. Their economic impact is small compared with the construction of new homes; at best they add confirmation to a trend in new home sales, permits, and starts. In September, existing home sales did continue to decline, by 2%, to 4.71 million units annualized (Note:...

Jobless claims flat for the moment  – by New Deal democrat There’s no big news in the jobless claims release this week. Initial claims fell -12,000 to 214,000, but the 4 week average increased 1,250 to 212,250. Continuing claims, which lag somewhat, increased 21,000 to 1,385,000: To the extent there is any discernible trend, I would call it sideways in the past few weeks. I had expected gas prices to continue to rise following OPEC’s...