The impotent US Fed may be stuck at the zero bound on its policy rates. But their monetary policies are no longer stimulative for the real economy.
Nobel prize winning economist Joseph Stiglitz weighs in on the disappointing US jobs report. Here is a direct video link.
Lakshman Achuthan, Economic Cycle Research Institute, explains why he thinks the U.S. economy is in a recession but we just don’t realize it. Here is a direct video link.
ECRI further offers this chart today comparing the 101,000 new jobs per month reported by the household survey over the past 12 months, as compared with the 194,000 payroll jobs per month estimated by the establishment survey, i.e., over a million fewer jobs over that 12-month period were reported by the US household survey.
As the chart shows, over the past decade, the mean revision to the 12-month moving average of job growth, as measured by the household survey, was only one-twenty-fifth that for payroll jobs. Since their longer-term patterns tend to be similar, the payroll jobs data are more likely to be revised down.
Separately, the household survey, adjusted to the payroll concept, actually shows a decline in employment since the summer.
Bottom line: even ignoring the December jobs data, the trends are worsening, especially for data not subject to major revision.
If you think we’re living in an unstable world, just listen to this: only one percent of our Earth is solid rock. Most of the other 99 percent is an oozing, mass, churning beneath our feet like road tar at temperatures between 2,000 and 10,000 degrees. The Earth’s crust is only 20 miles thick. When that cracks, one of the greatest forces in nature erupts. There are 1,500 active volcanoes. And, tonight, we want to tell you about three; one that caused the most recent mass disruption, another that’s the biggest threat to a major city and a third, in the United States that could wreak havoc all around the world. Volcanoes are found all over the world and many could spew lava and mass destruction — we just don’t know when. Here is a direct video link.
