Tuesday, January 31, 2012
Monday, January 30, 2012
Personal Consumption Expenditures
PCE decreased less than 0.1% in December, and real PCE decreased 0.1%. Note: The PCE price index, excluding food and energy, increased 0.2 percent.The personal saving rate was at 4.0% in December.
Friday, January 27, 2012
Home Sales
2011 was the worst year for new home sales since the Census Bureau started tracking sales in 1963. The three worst years were 2011, 2010, and 2009 - and 2008 is also on the worst ten list.4th Quarter 2011: 2.8% Growth
This is the first of three estimates for the period and marks the best growth rate in a year-and-a-half following a reading of 1.8 percent in the third quarter. But, don’t be surprised if the most recent data is revised lower since downward revisions have been the norm in recent quarters, the third quarter data starting out at a similar level – a 2.5 percent rate – when it was initially reported.source
Thursday, January 26, 2012
Wednesday, January 25, 2012
Tuesday, January 24, 2012
Federal Share of State Spending
State officials have become addicted to federal subsidies because they allow them to spend money taken from taxpayers across the country instead of having to ask their voters to pony up the funds. As the following charts shows, total state spending continued to increase during the economic downturn because the federal government picked up the slack. Note that the federal share of total state spending went from 25.7 percent in 2001 to 34.1 percent in 2011.
Monday, January 23, 2012
Friday, January 20, 2012
Thursday, January 19, 2012
Gold: Bull or Bear?
Gold set a record on September 5 at $1,895 an ounce (London PM Fix) and to date has fallen as low as $1,531 (December 29), a decline of 19.2%. In order to determine how long it might take to breach $1,895 again, I measured how long it took new highs to be mounted after big corrections in the past....
Once gold breaches its old high, you'll probably never be able to buy it at current prices again.
That's a rather obvious statement, but let it sink in. Buying now at $1,600 and then watching the price fall to, say, $1,500, wouldn't be fun – but it'll probably hit $2,000 or higher before the year's over, never to visit the $1,600s again this cycle. If that turns out to be correct, the next four months will be the very last time you can buy at these levels. You'll have to pay a higher price from then on.
That's a rather obvious statement, but let it sink in. Buying now at $1,600 and then watching the price fall to, say, $1,500, wouldn't be fun – but it'll probably hit $2,000 or higher before the year's over, never to visit the $1,600s again this cycle. If that turns out to be correct, the next four months will be the very last time you can buy at these levels. You'll have to pay a higher price from then on.
Wednesday, January 18, 2012
Tuesday, January 17, 2012
Debt to GDP Ratio
Often pundits will say that our current debt to GDP ratio is not unreasonable because it is not too high relative to the period following the WWII and the Great Depression.It is true that during the post WWII era, government spending exceeded GDP. Nevermind that FDR’s New Deal actually prolonged the Great Depression. And ignore the fact that despite conventional wisdom, World War II did nothing to create prosperity. As Bob Higgs has argued extensively, no amount of money pumped into a depressed economy can bring about genuine economic recovery unless investors and business leaders feel secure in their property rights.
source
Monday, January 16, 2012
Friday, January 13, 2012
sourceThursday, January 12, 2012
How to Measure Defense Spending?
“Defense spending at lowest levels in 60 years”:
In fact, Pentagon spending in real, inflation-adjusted dollars has roughly doubled since 2000 and is up about 50 percent since 1970, at the height of the Vietnam War.
In fact, Pentagon spending in real, inflation-adjusted dollars has roughly doubled since 2000 and is up about 50 percent since 1970, at the height of the Vietnam War.
Wednesday, January 11, 2012
North Dakota Oil Production
North Dakota's oil production has now surpassed OPEC-member Ecuador's daily production of 485,000 barrels. As a result of the ongoing oil boom in the Bakken area, North Dakota continues to lead the nation with the lowest state unemployment rate at 3.4% for November, more than 5 full percentage points below the nation's average 8.7% rate for November. There are nine North Dakota counties with jobless rates at or below 2% for November, and Williams County, which is at the center of the Bakken oil boom, boasts the lowest county jobless rate in the country at 0.9%.
source
Note: The US consumes about 19,000,000 barrels a day.
Tuesday, January 10, 2012
Monday, January 9, 2012
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