Tag: Economic Recovery

We Are Recovering!

Daily Agitator

Are tired of the spin yet?  Well, let us be honest and call it what it is…….LIES!

We hear daily that the economy is recovering….that the markets are up….that there are jobs being created (but at a slow rate) ……..corporate dividends are rising…….CEOs are making out like bandits……..yada…yada……but are we truly recovering?  According to many media outlets the recession has ended……but so far as I can see and I am not looking through rose colored glasses, it still sucks and many others are worse off than I…….

Let me see……8.9% unemployment with the real figure more like 19%……housing starts down to a 5 year low……home sales down…..foreclosures still rising……food prices up 6%…….gas prices rose by 4%….so what part of those figures look like a recovery is occurring?

OK, I will admit that if you can afford it and by it I mean investments, then you are in the middle of a recovery….but unfortunately, most Americans are NOT that heavily involved in the investing in stocks and bonds…..

But the American do not seem to see the recovery that the airwaves are reporting….

A new CNBC survey finds the percentage of Americans who believe the economy will get worse in the next year spiking to 37%, a 15 point gain from December. It’s now just five points below the all-time high of 43% in June 2008, which came in the midst of a surge in gasoline prices.

If you are an average middle class working family…..then you have NOT seen the recovery that those on Wall Street tell you that you are experiencing…….funny how that works……one part of society is doing fine and even maybe prospering and the other is stuck scratching out a living day to day, pay check to pay check…….

All the cheer leading for the economy is for those with cash to invest…..not you…your investments are such things as home payments, food, gas and the necessities….you have NO room for luxuries….what would you call this phenom?

Nation Building?

Daily Agitator

After the big war, WWII, the US was involved in the rebuilding of Germany and Japan, among others….but those were the biggest recipients of large injections of American cash….we help with all aspects of their respective societies…..from bridges to constitutions to actual governments….we were deeply involved….and look what that has done….those two nations became the leaders of the international economic world…all with the help of the US…..

Now, a quick trip in my magical mystery time machine port-a-let…….we skip ahead to the 21st century…..the US invaded and occupied two more countries….Afghanistan and Iraq…..and after relieving the countries of the dastardly leaders…..we set about building a nation from the ground up…..forced democracy..,…..and massive help with infrastructure as well……legislative construction all in the name of democracy……it was yet another story of nation building by the US……

There is been many to condemn our efforts to impose a political process on people that may NOT be ready or even want it….I have been one of those doing the condemning….I feel that it is NOT our place to tell others what they want or what they need, especially on how they should be governed….but beyond that I would like to say……

We DO need nation building…only the nation that we should be helping to improve is…… our own!  We need to spend all the cash that we are now pissing away in Iraq and Afghanistan to be spent right here in the good old US of A…….our infrastructure is falling down around our ears or schools are sadly inadequate…the cash would be much better spent on rebuilding our country and let others fend for themselves…..we have children right here that go to bed hungry and old people eating cat food without adequate housing…we need the nation building as much if not more than the other parts of the world that we feel are so needy….the US is as needy as anywhere else…..

Spend the money here….Nation build here……make the US as prosperous as you want other countries to be….we deserve a fighting chance from our government……

Can We Be Real For A Moment?

This just in!  Retail sales were the strongest they have been in months this September….the recovery has begun!

That is what all the financial pundits want you to believe but there is more to this story than the increase in sales thanx to Black Friday and Cyber Monday….really!  There is more to it!

But now…for something completely different……..

The Middle Class will keep their tax cuts…..hooray!  But so will the wealthy……..and the promise is that they will start creating jobs because now they know they can keep their money…..think about that logic for a moment……..(pause here for reflection)….but at least the unemployed will keep some of the benefits that come with that stigma…..

By the by…..the tax cuts for the wealthy will add about #4 trillion to the debt….which apparently is NOT that important to the GOP  when it comes to aid for the wealthy…..but that is something that they will coat over with some sort of silver lining…..

The whole argument from the GOP was that if the wealthy kept their tax cuts they would start investing in the economy again and thus would start creating jobs….so the GOP held up the unemployment to get their buds more cash in their pockets….think about that for a minute……(another pause for reflection)……….

Another point and this one from the head doodah of the FED…….

The nation’s unemployment rate, which has been over 9 percent for a record 19 months, is not likely to return to “a more normal unemployment rate” of about 5 percent or 6 percent for four or five years, the Federal Reserve chairman said in an interview with the CBS News program “60 Minutes” broadcast on Sunday night.

And then there is this bit of news……

Most observers expect no signs of a turnaround anytime soon. The Federal Reserve has predicted that unemployment will be around 9 percent by the end of 2011, and around 8 percent by the end of 2012. As Dean Baker of the liberal Center for Economic and Policy Research wrote Friday:

Does not sound like he expects too many jobs to be created for an extended time…..and yet the idea has been sold that if the wealthy keep their cash they will start up and begin created jobs…..think about that, please…….(a pause for reflection…one more time)…..

The GOP is correct in their thinking….the jobs will start pouring in on or about 01 January 2011.   Or could it be that they will just continue buying luxury items and say “screw the jobless”?

My money (both physically and literally) is on the latter!

And guess what….if the jobs do not magical appear, then it will somehow be all Obama’s fault…….well do not hold your breath…besides there is NO proof that tax cuts create jobs….only in the lying heart of a politician…….

Hey voters!  You asked for it….you got it…..what?  A good humping!

Allow me to be blunt here……IT IS ALL A LIE!

To quote a famous pitch man…….”can you hear me NOW!?”

Jobs–Issue #1

2010 Election series

Lecture #5

In less than week we have our thrilling yet somehow moronic mid-terms–and we all have heard the boring ads…..that healthcare is killing America….tax cuts will create jobs….the unemployed are lazy……social security is killing the country…..that the car is in a ditch….and on and on……all in all it is all a mind f*ck….no matter which side of the spectrum you wish to stand……it is ALL a mind f*ck!

The only thing Americans and I mean real Americans…you know the type…they work for a living and scratch out a small existence month to month….are worried about is….JOBS!  Where are the job?  Will I have a job next month?  Will job market improve?  All in all….this mid-term is about JOBS and JOBS alone!

Now friends…ask yourself, which one of the babbling idiots will really have a plan to create jobs?

Tax cuts?  Let’s see how many have the tax cuts creating so far?  Will privatization of SS create jobs?  Tell me, oh great sage, which one of the “people” and I use the term loosely have a REAL plan for job creation?  Would like an answer?  Alrighty then……not one of the candidates has a real plan to create a single job…they do have a slick tongue to deceive the mindless…and this mid-term will illustrate just how gullible the American voter really is…..sorry guys….YOU HAVE BEEN DUPED!  Again!

You know an intelligent being would learn from their mistakes…not so with the American voter…..they just keep flushing their vote down the toilet….time after time……a pathetic indictment of the American political system….

Where’s The Beef?

College of Political Knowledge

Economic Desk

If you are old enough to remember the old broad that use to do the Wendy’s commercial, I think…I am old and not very sharp on ads……

It this case the “beef” is DEMAND….I have been bitching about the slow recovery saying that these dinks created liquidity for the banks and should have created demand….for demand is the only way to recover from this recession…..the most recent data as posted by AP:

First-time claims for jobless benefits edged up by 2,000 to a seasonally adjusted 484,000, the Labor Department said Thursday. Analysts had expected a drop. That’s the highest total since February.

Initial claims have now risen in three of the last four weeks and are close to their high point for the year of 490,000, reached in late January. The four-week average, which smooths volatility, soared by 14,250 to 473,500, also the highest since late February.

The report comes after the Federal Reserve said Tuesday that “employers remain reluctant to add to payrolls.” The central bank said the pace of economic recovery is likely to be more modest than anticipated.

And on Wednesday, the Commerce Department said June imports jumped while exports dropped. That pushed the trade gap to its widest point since October 2008. Many economists say that could reduce economic growth estimates in the April-to-June quarter to 1.2 percent — half the 2.4 percent annual rate the government estimated last month.

That’s a sharp slowdown from the 5 percent growth in the final quarter of 2009 and the 3.7 percent pace in the January-to-March quarter. That weakening could be prompting more employers to cut staff, or at least hold off on hiring.

And the other indicators are NOT looking so good…like foreclosures up 12% over last month……housing starts are slow…about the only thing looking good as far as the economy goes is the bonuses given by corporations and the earnings per share by most companies….

Nothing listed above will help create demand and without it there is zero chance of a good stable recovery.

Don’t Look Now But It Is Not Over!

We hear daily conflicting reports on how the economy is doing….first it is good, then after adjustments, not so good….we hear that banks are paying out massive bonuses and still using taxpayer cash…..we hear lots of manure daily, weekly and monthly on the condition of the American economy……investors are thrilled at the news…but the rest of us wait for our turn for attention…

Neil Barofsky of the TARP Fund office sees something a little different than the media:

Neil Barofsky, the special inspector general for the US bank bailout, released his quarterly report to Congress Saturday, saying, “It is hard to see how any of the fundamental problems in the [financial] system have been addressed to date.”

The document claimed that the financial system is more dangerous now than ever before because banks have reason to think the government will step in again when their speculative bets go bad. “Even if TARP saved our financial system from driving off a cliff back in 2008, absent meaningful reform, we are still driving on the same winding mountain road, but this time in a faster car,” Barofsky wrote.

Following the financial meltdown, the biggest banks grew even bigger as they bought up their failed rivals. As Barofsky put it in his report, “To the extent that huge, interconnected, ‘too big to fail’ institutions contributed to the crisis, those institutions are now even larger, in part because of the substantial subsidies provided by TARP and other bailout programs.”

The report emphasized that, despite the trillions of dollars provided by the bailout, the banks have continued to decrease lending. Barofsky stated, “Although there was this public disclosure that the purpose of these programs was to increase lending, very little, if anything, was done to encourage or direct lending.”

The report does not sound too cheery about the future of the economy…….it seems that the same conditions that caused the economic problems are still there and waiting for the next chance to throw a monkey wrench into the machinery of the economy…..no amount of cash thrown at a problem will solve it if the underlying conditions remain…it is NOT rocket science….it is common sense….

What Is China Doing Right?

By now the entire world is reeling from the recession that has effected everyone, in one way or another….economic growth has been dismal and recovery has been slow…..but yet there is a bright spot….China….

the UK’s Guardian is reporting:

The Chinese economy returned to double digit growth in the fourth quarter, with a jump of 10.7% year-on-year, but inflation is creeping up again amid fears of overheating.

Although the fourth quarter GDP figure was slightly below analysts’ expectations, it was the fastest for two years and a marked increase on the previous quarter’s 9.1%. It took 2009’s growth to 8.7%, outstripping the official growth target of 8%, the level some believe essential to create enough jobs to match growth in the labour force.

“China has become the first, on the whole, to achieve recovery and stabilization in its economy,” Ma Jiantang, commissioner of the National Bureau of Statistics, told a press conference in Beijing. But he said China would avoid major adjustments to economic policy given the “uncertainties” it still faces and a weak global outlook.

So, what is China doing right?  In the sense that they are showing a steady growth in their economy…..

ADDENDUM:  I have seen a reason for this success (?)…….at least according to the AP:

Bank of China plans to sell up to 40 billion yuan ($5.8 billion) in bonds to replenish its capital and meet government standards following a record surge in lending last year amid Beijing’s stimulus measures, a state-run news agency reported.Regulators have warned some banks that they have fallen below minimum capital requirements after handing out some 9.5 trillion yuan in loans last year. Banks are expected to scale back lending to roughly 7.5 trillion yuan in 2010.

China’s banking industry is regarded as the healthiest of any major economy because institutions avoided the mortgage-related turmoil that battered Western lenders.

Beijing hopes cooling the pace of lending will keep its economy growing without creating inflation and overheating. Other nations are counting on that growth and a healthy demand from China for their goods for their own recoveries.

Will The Economy Recover In 2010?

Personal opinion….not a chance!

The Economic Policy Center has a report of the lasting effects of the current recession…..

Educational achievement: Unemployment and income losses can reduce educational achievement by threatening early childhood nutrition; reducing families’ abilities to provide a supportive learning environment (including adequate health care, summer activities, and stable housing); and by forcing a delay or abandonment of college plans.• Opportunity: Recession-induced job and income losses can have lasting consequences on individuals and families. The increase in poverty that will occur as a result of the recession, for example, will have lasting consequences for kids, and will impose long-lasting costs on the economy.

• Private investment: Total non-residential investment is down by 20% from peak levels through the second quarter of 2009. The reduction in investment will lead to reduced production capacity for years to come. Furthermore, since technology is often embedded in new capital equipment, the investment slowdown can also be expected to reduce the adoption of new innovations.

• Entrepreneurial activity and business formation: New and small businesses are often at the forefront of technological advancement. With the credit crunch and the reduction in consumer demand, small businesses are seeing a double squeeze. For example, in 2008, 43,500 businesses filed for bankruptcy, up from 28,300 businesses in 2007 and more than double the 19,700 filings in 2006. Only 21 active firms had an initial public offering in 2008, down from an average of 163 in the four years prior.

Some economists are saying that the US economy will grow at a  pathetic rate of 2% over the years of the decade……all predictions say that the jobs will not return this year and may not return for several years……all in all the outlook for the middle class is dreary for the foreseeable future….the wealthy have a much brighter future than the rest of us…..we could change that….but we Americans are NOT that courageous….sad right?

Can Wall Street Be Regulated?

By now all the world knows is how big Wall Street is and how they can make or break an economy…..and recently they broke the whole damn thing!

And because they, Wall Street, was too big to fail….there is a growing attitude in Washington that these little turds need to be more accountable for their actions….something they are fighting tooth and nail to avoid…..

It all began (I think) with Sen, Cantwell…..as reported in the Huffington Post:

Morning Meeting, Dylan Ratigan brought on Senator Maria Cantwell (D-Wash.) to discuss the ongoing attempts to achieve a measure of financial reform, so that the widespread systemic failures of “too big to fail” banking institutions that cratered the economy maybe don’t happen again. Cantwell went off: “The shenanigans just began here in Washington.” Cantwell continued, “What is moving through on the House side is a bill that supposedly has a new rule, but has so many loopholes that the loophole eats the rule. We want to say we have transparency and regulation, but it will continue to have loopholes.”At issue were some specific holes in the Defense against Wall Street’s Dark Arts. First: no government oversight of which derivatives get traded on open, transparent exchanges. Instead of the SEC or other regulators making decisions on what goes on the exchange, the exchange would be overseen by banks, who are strongly incentivized to keep derivatives off of exchanges, where they make less money.

And all the hoopla has not stopped there…..as reported in the WSJ:

A key House panel voted Wednesday to give government the power to break up large financial firms whose collapse might threaten the broader economy, despite aggressive lobbying by major financial institutions to kill the measure.The amendment illustrates how some lawmakers are willing to go beyond the authority sought by the White House — which stopped short of giving regulators power to break up healthy firms — in the redrawing of the financial world’s regulatory framework.

A divided House Financial Services Committee voted 38-29 to approve an amendment offered by Rep. Paul Kanjorski (D, Penn.) that would allow a council of regulators to determine whether factors including the size or interconnectedness of an individual firm pose “a grave threat to the United States.” Such a firm could be prohibited from merging with another firm or be required to sell business units or assets.

The amendment is part of a broader legislative overhaul of financial-sector rules pending in Congress. If enacted, the government would have the authority to act aggressively to deal with a systemically risky failure before problems become too unwieldy.

All in all a good start at controlling the runaway theft of Wall Street…but will it succeed?  Most likely it will not…..Wall Street has “friends” in Washington…all of whom are bought and paid for….these “friends” will not allow Wall Street to lose any of their clout…..

The beast of Wall Street has been allowed to run free for way too long to try and domesticate it now……it may get those trying some votes back home but it will do little to control or tame Wall Street….

Should He Stay Or Should He Go?

That is the question that is being batted around Washington these days…the “HE”  is Geithner the Obama Secretary of the Treasury….in recent hearings on Capital Hill…..the following is being reported in The Hill:

Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner is coming under new pressure from conservative Republicans and liberal Democrats to resign.

Reps. Peter DeFazio (D-Ore.) and Kevin Brady (R-Texas) this week joined a small group of lawmakers publicly calling for Geithner to step down. Former Republican Rep. Rob Simmons, who is challenging Sen. Chris Dodd (D) for Senate in Connecticut, has made Geithner’s resignation a campaign issue.

This week’s criticism was sparked by a report from Neil Barofsky, the special inspector general over the $700 billion bailout program. Barofsky concluded that officials at the Federal Reserve, including Geithner, who was head of the New York Fed, made a series of missteps in the bailout of American International Group (AIG).

Barofsky faulted Fed officials, including Geithner, for a negotiating strategy regarding the firm’s complex derivatives that “offered little opportunity for success.” The report said that the Fed paid full value to settle the derivatives contracts, which meant tens of billions of dollars went to the big American and foreign banks that were AIG’s counterparties in the deals.

Maybe these little jerks should read my blog, among others, we brought up all this concern back in March…..we said then that he, Geithner,  should not have been confirmed let alone ever had been nominated…..after he was confirmed we pointed out that he would not be the “savior” he has been portrayed as……we bloggers were truly the visionaries, at least when it comes to Geithner and the economy….but we do not get any of the credit….nope….it will be the “politicians” that saw this coming and that will be a lie…..not misinformation….an out right LIE!

Repubs did not like him….only because he was nominated by Obama…if it had been the nomination by a Repub prez then he would have been eagerly accepted…..bloggers were about the only ones that wrote against his nomination and later confirmation of little Timmy Geithner as Secretary of the Treasury……

Since few recognize the contribution and the foresight of bloggers…I feel it necessary to give them an “atta boy”……..it would be nice if people, especially politicians, would read and appreciate the insight us bloggers have at times…..are we always correct….hell no!….but we do have our moments…..and the Geithner situation is one of our finest….