Tag Archives: US EConomics

Another week of good news on jobless claims  – by New Deal democrat Initial jobless claims had been in an almost relentless uptrend from the end of March through early August. Since then, they have completely reversed. This week initial claims declined another -6,000 to 222,000, and the 4 week average declined -7,500 to 233,000. Continuing claims, which lag somewhat, increased another 36,000 to 1,473,000, a 5 month high: There was a...

The average age of the American farmer has been stuck at 57.5 since 2017 and hasn’t seemed to budged into 2021 despite an explosion of new farmer operators choosing to quit their pandemic day jobs and head for the fields to participate in small plot farming and local market vending. Generationally, the unfortunate circumstance with an aging farmer population and high land values equates to what Agricultural Economics Professor Dr. Shannon Ferrell of...

by Joseph Joyce China and the Debt Crisis Sri Lanka is not the first developing economy to default on its foreign debt, and certainly won’t be the last. The Economist has identified 53 countries as most vulnerable to a combination of “heavy debt burdens, slowing global growth and tightening financial conditions.” The response of China to what will be a rolling series of restructurings and write-downs will reveal much about its position in the...

If I was going to guess, and I do not have to do so, it appears the US is retooling to update capabilities. Maybe they will put forth a plan to minimize inventory too. The source of all this retooling? Probably using up the money made during the pandemic and also government funds invested in infrastructure. And maybe, they are creating minimal setups to handle a variety of product like we did for one supplier of hoods to Chrysler. Automotive still...

 Lawrence Mishel and Josh Bivens  at Economic Policy Institute take a look at why wages have been relatively flat compared to productivity gains in the US economy, inequality of compensation, and declining share of income between labor and capital. Broad strokes but helps with context and suggesting ideas for current government actions. Inequalities abound in the U.S. economy, and a central driver in recent decades is the widening gap...

On Labor Day 2022, how well is labor doing? This is Labor Day, so let’s take a look at a few metrics of how labor is doing. As an initial aside, occasionally I get asked why I write about expansions and recessions. An important reason is, pretty much by definition during recessions jobs and income decline. During expansions they, well, expand. So forecasting whether the period ahead will feature better or worse conditions for job-holding and...

A bit of history leading up to the creation of Labor Day as a holiday, the first day of celebration, the politics, how it came to be, and the politics as told by Prof. Heather. That first celebration being held September 5, 1882; at noon that day, when the marchers arrived at Reservoir Park, the termination point of the parade. While some returned to work, most continued on to the post-parade party at Wendel’s Elm Park at 92nd Street and Ninth...

[unable to retrieve full-text content]Weekly Indicators for August 29 – September 2 at Seeking Alpha My Weekly Indicators post is up at Seeking Alpha. The consumer portion of the economy continues to benefit from lower gas prices, while the producer side continues to suffer from higher interest rates. As usual, clicking over and reading will bring you up to the […] The post Weekly Indicators for August 29 – September 2 at Seeking Alpha appeared first on Angry Bear.

August jobs report: despite a good headline number, the decelerating trend resumes  I have written a number of times since February that the short leading indicators have signaled that we should expect weaker monthly employment reports, with both fewer new jobs and a higher unemployment rate. That was completely *not* the case in July, In August, would the decelerating trend kick in again? That it did. Since February the 3 month average in new...

A respite in manufacturing in August, continued decline in construction in July As usual, the new month’s first data is for manufacturing and construction. Here’s a look at each. The ISM manufacturing index, and especially its new orders subindex, is an important short leading indicator for the production sector. In August, after two months of showing slight contraction, the leading new orders subindex improved to 51.3, indicating expansion....