Tag: economy

No surprise with job numbers – buried reality in last line

2 cents: It would figure that this report would be as such. Over the past couple years many of the job reports have had to be adjusted to reveal even worse numbers than expected but received no MSM traction or headlines.

In addition is the key to the understanding some of the reality involved in this Reuters story is the fact buried at the last line of the story. Emphasis added.

 

WASHINGTON (AP) — The U.S. unemployment rate fell to 7.8 percent last month, dropping below 8 percent for the first time in nearly four years. The rate declined because more people found work, a trend that could have an impact on undecided voters in the final month before the presidential election.

The Labor Department said Friday that employers added 114,000 jobs in September. The economy also created 86,000 more jobs in July and August than first estimated. Wages rose in September and more people started looking for work.

The revisions show employers added 146,000 jobs per month from July through September, up from 67,000 in the previous three months. The unemployment rate fell from 8.1 percent in August, matching its level in January 2009 when President Barack Obama took office.

The decline could help Obama, who is coming off a disappointing debate performance against GOP challenger Mitt Romney.

Stock futures rose modestly after the report. Dow Jones industrial average futures, up 30 points just before the report came out, were up 45 points after it was released.

The yield on the 10-year U.S. Treasury note climbed to 1.73 percent from 1.68 percent just before the report, a sign that investors were more willing to embrace risk and moving money from bonds into stocks.

The job market has been improving, sluggishly but steadily. Jobs have been added for 24 straight months. There are now 325,000 more than when Obama took office.

The September gains were led by the health care industry, which added 44,000 jobs — the most since February. Transportation and warehousing also showed large gains. The revisions showed that governments actually added 63,000 jobs in July and August, compared with earlier estimates that showed losses.

Still, many of the jobs added last month were part time. The number of people with part-time jobs who wanted full-time work rose 7.5 percent to 8.6 million.

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Great advice

A great article I wanted to share about addressing real problems in our nation and identifying possible solutions. This is the kind of dialogue we should expect and see from our government but instead it is coming from a commentary writer for the Washington Post.

Washington Post

Great advice that Romney, the current administration and our Congress should act on.

We – the citizens – should hold our government’s feet to the fire and demand action along these lines.

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Zombie economy and depitalism

I read an article over CNBC that referenced the US economy is acting like a zombie economy or at best a sleepwalking one.

Why aren’t the talking heads and so-called experts thinking things through?

1. We know that the great drive of the economy in the past consisted of at least high consumer debt and confidence (depitalism).
2. Today there is very little confidence and the debt has come to roost.

This has resulted in consumers having to pay down debt and —- here is the good news —– make better spending choices. Ultimately this is good for the country but we are still in the taking the medicine phase which the medicine usually tastes horrible. The businesses, government and financial industry have to wake up and find the new normal and act from there. MSM and all the news makers need to quit comparing THIS economy to the past SO THAT CONFIDENCE can increase. We don’t want an economy supported by lies, high debt and worthless paper; what we want and DESPERATELY NEED is an economy based on fiscal responsibility (consumer and governments) and real value/worth.

 

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Taxmegeddon

In this The Week magazine is the Briefing article titled Countdown to Taxmegeddon. The gist is because the CES and our Congress can not and will not work together they have kept kicking the budget ball a little bit further so as not to actually deal with the issue. Now with the election strategies being in full force, the ball is being kicked out further still. Thing is this ball has an expiration date – and it is midnight December 31, 2012. Now barring a Mayan calendar, Nibiru cataclysm occurring – our government needs to address the matters involved with this ball that they keep kicking ahead. From the article – emphasis added:

…a combination of $8 trillion in tax hikes and spending cuts scheduled to begin taking effect Jan. 1, 2013. If the country goes off that cliff, economists say, we’ll plunge right back into recession. At midnight on Dec. 31, the Bush-era tax cuts are due to expire, raising income tax rates across the board to levels last seen in 2001. President Obama’s 2 percent payroll tax holiday will end, too, along with a host of other business and investment tax breaks. All told, four out of five U.S. households would face an average of $3,701 more in taxes next year, according to the Tax Policy Center; the federal government’s tax haul would increase by $399 billion….At the same time, the first $100 billion in automatic cuts to defense spending and domestic programs such as Medicare will kick in, under an agreement reached last summer by a congressional super-committee. Together, these measures would squeeze more than $600 billion out of the economy next year alone.

If Congress and the White House don’t act, according to the Congressional Budget Office, the massive tax hikes and spending cuts could knock 4 percent off the country’s projected economic growth. That would probably mean a 1.3 percent contraction in the first half of the year — a recession. “It’s two to three times bigger in negative terms than even the biggest year of the stimulus was in positive terms,” said Austan Goolsbee, former chairman of President Obama’s Council of Economic Advisers.

What this means is following the election the two parties will know who is victor and then the victor will push their agenda in the effort to deal with this ball in their own way. The REALITY is the so-called losing side of the election is not going to be ‘in the spirit” to cooperate (see Congress since the last election) so what is actually good for the citizens = the country will be kicked to the curb in the ongoing political warfare known as partisan politics. What is required is the citizens of the USA to revolt against the current mutated system and install a federal government that is acting for the best of the country. Sad truth is —– it won’t happen. The society in our country today is secular, narcissistic and immoral and the so-called founding fathers wrote the framework for our country with the mentality that the people of the nation would be moral, other-centered and God fearing. Today what we have as a nation of people is – individuals more infatuated with so-called reality TV, sports and entertainment . The haves and have-nots have a horrendous gap separating them and a mentality of us vs. them so that each side pushes the other side even further and further away.  Our country – my country – is on life-support  and I’m not sure the healthcare staff (government) is going to actually save the patient. We have huge problem that is going to come to its full maturity and when it does our nation will die. It is inevitable.

Proverbs 29:2 KJV  When the righteous are in authority, the people rejoice: but when the wicked beareth rule, the people mourn.

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Two cents

2 cents on a couple news stories:

Egypt – NYT Headline: Egypt Military Softens Tone as Vote Count Favors Islamist – what is going to happen is this individual and his cronies are going to speak eloquently and fervently for democracy in Egypt. He and they (Muslim Brotherhood) will beat their chests and flail their arms about saying the people of Egypt have spoken….democracy in our time….military ties to Mubarrak and past…. military dictatorship….we the people…. and you will hear and see talking heads in MSM and our government and EU etc. speak about democracy…. Arab spring…. blah, blah, blah. What is actually happening is the Muslim brotherhood positioning itself so as to look innocent, blah…blah… but its goal is to strip the military of being a check and balance in and of the government. Once the military is stripped and without a doubt key posts created and placed in the military by the new Egyptian president the real face and heart of the Muslim brotherhood will creep out and quickly and violently smash democracy and freedom in the country and replace it with something kin to Iran and the Taliban. Islamist extremism of the hateful kind. And it may take 5 to 10 years to get there. Maybe even 20. But they know they have history over 6000 years and time is on their side.

Greece – NYT Headline: After Greek Vote, Europe Still Has a Host of Problems – I GUARANTEE O breathed a deep sigh of relief when the election results were announced. And it is true that there is a host of problem ahead for the EU. But the “good news” is that all of those problems more than likely will not fully rear their ugly heads until the winter or next spring. Systemic change NEEDS to occur in the EU but – just like the US – noone really wants the crud and wading through it on their watch. “Push it fwd!” “I/We inherited these problems!” And so on. I am not a doomsayer BUT I do have common sense and that leads me to believe things can not continue on as they have been and the EU, US, world economies get miraculously healthy.

 

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2 cents

2 cents on various recent headlines/stories:

1. CES & the illegal residents move: was completely about getting Hispanic votes in the next Nov. election and was done in an unconstitutional way (just like CESCare). Don’t be surprised if this ends up at the Supreme Court as well. Of course the other motive is to hopefully position those people who expect our government to follow the constitution and demand an appeal as anti-Hispanic, bigots etc. Just like we don’t care about those who don’t have health care which is also a farce.

These two issues are good examples of why some people point out that the CES is anti-America, socialist, ashamed of America — etc. In these two instances (it can be argued there are other examples but for the time being I limit to these two) he has ignored the constitution and did what HE thinks is right because HE KNOWS BETTER than the group of white men a couple hundred years ago whom allowed slavery to continue. Obviously HE is more enlightened than they are. CES – is a cancer in our government, economy and society. He is destroying the very system (the constitution) that holds our nation together. What other word would you call him but cancer? Well actually their are many other words but in this illustration cancer is the one I am thinking of.

2. Greece/Egypt presidential votes today:
Egypt: What is going on now is the constant deck reshuffling until a hand is given that can be played successfully that will no longer be an ally to Israel. While the decks shuffle over and over more and more Bedouin and terrorist missile attacks are fired into southern Israel from Egypt. What these people are wanting is an escalation in activity and harsh retaliation from Israel – and yes – Arab loss of lives so that the people of Egypt will foam at the mouth with hate against Israel and expect their government to side with Arabs and not with Jews.Catalysts to this strategy is far right Islam and the Muslim Brotherhood — these two groups are one in the same. It is going to get much worse on the south border of Israel.

Greece: is a wildcard in my opinion. The so called right parties which are promising to drop the Euro and austerity measures if they get elected can and should expect some serious arm twisting from the members and leadership of the EU and USA if they are indeed elected. IF they are elected the eyes will immediately refocus and look to Spain, Italy & Portugal to see if there is an increase in bank activities – people withdrawing their savings etc. If that happens TPTB here in America and the stock market may start selling stock figuring a downturn is coming which of course will create a downturn in and of itself. Like I explained to my wife last night – it is again about perception. TPTB and the stock market see what they determine as a negative reaction in these other countries (not to mention in Greece itself) the thinking goes that these people — consumers — will go into pocketbook pinch mode which translates into no or much less purchasing of products which impacts to some significant degree the US mfg exports (less demand) so US mfg react (correctly) with decreases in production which leads to more off-time for employees and if it is not a very short term event, then  it will result in layoffs etc. ALL occurring in a US economy that is not in good place such that even the most miniscule decrease of production and exports will create large ripples across the economy. The economy is moving so slow that you can apply the brakes to it via the Fred Flintstone method. The possible silver lining in all this is that it is believe if the economy slows further or even dips again – even in the slightest of ways – that CES will then lose the next presidential election. The truth of the matter is that he should lose the next election anyway, the freaking socialist.

3. It is not just the US that had embraced depitalism as the behavior in the majority of households. It is something that has permeated the EU and Japan. China at the moment is repeating the mistakes of the US during the industrial age but making those mistakes in a communist government that greatly reduces the liberty of the citizens. The Frankenstein creature they are creating over there will be interesting and scary if we ever learn and understand all the details about it. Mexico, South America, India and Africa are so poor and overtly corrupt that they are pinned in.  There are of course other countries like Australia and Russia but I understand little if anything about what is really going in there. So that makes my focus on the US, EU, the Middle East and Japan. For the US, EU and Japan depitalism is the average households’ method of livelihood and finally people/consumers are realizing how debilitating debt is. Much change still will occur as households and companies find their new norm. In the US we will continue to see very slow and poor economic results each month until some systemic changes/improvements occurs in our economic infrastructure and it is in my opinion that those improvements will not occur if CES continues into a second term. In fact we will see things get much worse here.

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