Tag Archives: US EConomics

The “Consumer nowcast” recession warning is triggered, as real wages decline, real aggregate payrolls near stall, plus record mortgage payments  – by New Deal democrat No economic news today. So, now that we have the September inflation read, let’s take a look at a couple of important consumer indicators: real average wages, and real aggregate payrolls for non-supervisory workers. Real average hourly wages for non-supervisory employees have...

Infidel753: “A dastardly plot,” Infidel753 Blog While winning a Senate majority increasingly looks out of reach for Republicans, a House majority is distinctly possible.  If they get it, they plan to force Democrats to make concessions which would almost certainly include cuts to Social Security and Medicare — possibly by drastically raising the eligibility age, though if they really want to cut spending quickly, it’s hard to see how they could...

Weekly Indicators for October 10 – 14 at Seeking Alpha  – by New Deal democrat My Weekly Indicators post is up at Seeking Alpha. Just about everything looks awful. And one bright spot, consumer spending as measured by Redbook, just got dimmer. Needless to say, if consumer spending rolls over, that’s pretty much the ball game.. You can be brought up to the virtual moment in the ugliness by clicking over and reading, and it will reward...

September real retail sales lay another egg  – by New Deal democrat One of my favorite indicators, retail sales, was reported for September this morning, and it came in unchanged. Which means that after factoring in +0.4% inflation in September, real retail sales were down -0.4%. Which is not good, because real retail sales have gone nowhere in 18 months, and have been down every single month since April with the exception of August, and are...

“Initial claims continue to rise along with gas prices“  – by New Deal democrat Last week I wrote that initial jobless claims may have ended their recent downtrend. This week appears to have confirmed that. Initial claims rose 9,000 to 228,000, and the 4 week average rose 5,000 to 211,500. Continuing claims, which lag somewhat, increased 3,000 to 1,368,000: With OPEC deliberately cutting back production in order to cause a shortage in...

As the economy slows, so has producer price growth  – by New Deal democrat Consumer prices for September will be released tomorrow. This morning the upstream producer prices were released. Total PPI rose by 0.4%, after two straight months of decline; but excluding those and December 2021, the lowest monthly increase since November 2020. Here are the monthly changes compared with CPI: YoY producer prices increased at the lowest rate in a...

I believe we are. This is kind of interesting. The article on the budget deficit is from August. From what I have been reading in WaPo, etc., they are claiming the deficit increased. This does not surprise me either with all the inflation occurring from oil, supply chain issues, etc. The question to ask is whether we are worse off than the 2008 collapse of Wall Street and the resulting recession. This article is from Politico; “White House...

Scenes from the September jobs report by New Deal democrat No important economic news this week until Wednesday. I was going to put up a book review for Indigenous Peoples’ Day, but it got too long and involved, so maybe tomorrow. Instead, here’s a look at some of the more important metrics I was tracking for last Friday’s employment report. Historically, month over month growth in jobs tends to peak near the middle of an expansion (averaged...

I have always had some piece of Patagonia gear in my go-camping or back-packing equipment or just wear around town accessories. Usually bought at Erehwon, in Madison Wisconsin. REI moved into town and also featured similar Patagonia product. Patagonia is upper end product and not cheap in price unless you could catch a sale. It was also considered fashionable to have the label on your clothing. Visited the Flag Ship REI store in Denver. Pretty...

In this rare Sunday edition, just a quick update. We are nearing harvest close up north as the weather changes and nightly freezes make morning harvests a challenge for whatever goodies are still left on the stalks. I doubt much is left in the actual fields up north, but down south, second harvest has come up, mostly cotton, and some late planted sorghum that some folks planted after a dismal corn harvest, wild fires and drought have caused in come...