Thursday, February 18, 2010
Scary economic forecast prediction of the day
A major financial institution -- one of those that has been right more often than wrong in recent years -- just showed me some scary output from their model of the U.S. economy, to wit: In order for the American unemployment rate to decline from 10% to 6%, GDP will have to increase by 5% for 16 consecutive quarters. How possible is that? In the last 80 quarters, there have only been 10 that grew so quickly.
Point is, barring a growth miracle -- and the Obama administration's regulatory apparatus is not exactly promoting growth, whatever else may be said about it -- the unemployment rate will still be much higher than the recent norm in November 2012.
10 Comments:
By 
Purple Avenger, at
Thu Feb 18, 01:42:00 PM:
the Obama administration's regulatory apparatus is not exactly promoting growth
An even scarier thought - what if that is intentional?
By 
, at
Thu Feb 18, 02:34:00 PM:
The Kenyan's sole objective is to destroy the middle class in America. Everything else is incidental.
He will try to spend so outrageously in the short term so as to be able to claim that defense spending must be reduced to almost zero.
Actually, it is NOT the Kenyan's objective, he is not smart enough, it is the objective of his handlers, his owners, those who write his speeches.
By , at
Thu Feb 18, 04:04:00 PM:
OK, that is just cuckoo. Do you really think the President's goal is to destroy the country? We are in bizarro-land with that one.
He's just incompetant. And so are his graduate student interns, otherwise known as the Cabinet, as are the idiots who run Congress.
Fixing the country will require Americans to suck it up and accept cuts in federal spending. Yeah, yeah, I know, people say they're in favor of spending reductions but when they see smaller Social Security and Medicare payments (because thats the inevitable and unavoidable end game), will they really accept it as the right thing to do? We're going to find out.
By Mrs. Davis, at
Thu Feb 18, 04:43:00 PM:
They're going to be accepted. The question is will they be accepted voluntarily or at the insistence of the Chinese and Japanese.
Oh, a war is a great way to reduce unemployment. Especially with people you owe a lot of money to who aren't very happy with you as a deadbeat and who think they are ready to assume their rightful place in the hierarchy of nations by knocking you down a peg or two.
By , at
Thu Feb 18, 06:10:00 PM:
Plenty of similar analyses have been published on various financial websites, e.g., ZeroHedge, Financial Times, Seeking Alpha, etc. Most unbiased reports predict that the U3 unemployment rate will remain at about 10% for years to come. Official U6 will remain under 20% while ShadowStats unadjusted U6 will be well above 20%. Lots of new people entering the workforce and no new jobs.
The good news is that if this is true then Obama will likely be out in 2012, securing his legacy as the worst President since Carter and maybe in modern history. The best thing that could happen for Obama is for Republicans to take both houses of Congress. It would force Obama into Clintonian moderation, and might get him a second term. It makes me shudder just to think about it.
By Charlottesvillain, at
Thu Feb 18, 07:31:00 PM:
By JPMcT, at
Thu Feb 18, 07:55:00 PM:
No worries, everybody! The president is forming a National Committe on Fiscal Responsibility!!!
Four Democrats, four Republicans and four Obama appointees!!
Good heavens...it's "bipartisan"...WE ARE SAVED!!!
By , at
Thu Feb 18, 08:30:00 PM:
My former provider of child day care is now retired. She lives in a very comfortable three room apartment, public housing, with a lovely garden (when not covered by snow). She visits her various doctors about once every three months, mostly for social interaction, and has a massage therapist come to her house once every week. Medicaid and Medicare pay for all that. The Housing Authority provides a van service to the grocery store, the bank and for around town errands. She lives on Social Security primarily, despite having immigrated to this country as a middle-aged adult (how does that work?!). She sends extra money to her childen, every month. I care very much for so I don't begrudge her the prosperous retirement, but I admit to envy.
By John F. Opie, at
Fri Feb 19, 12:47:00 PM:
Hi -
I've stolen the following from someone else:
/***
I know I sound like a broken record, but we simply need to demand a higher quality of work from our government.
/***
So true, so true.
I put it this way on my blog (shameless plug):
I've talked about this here before: the prevalence of lawyers and accountants - and even lawyers who are also accountants, and accountants who are also lawyers - in management is dangerous. Not because these folks are somehow deficient or evil, but rather because they don't understand how the economy works.
They just think they do. We've seen the results.
By , at
Fri Feb 26, 01:19:00 PM:
Wells Fargo? They showed me the same graphic. Were they trying to sell you IR derivatives?
Does not mean it wasn't true or a "value add" from the bank.
