Thursday’s big 200 point rally of the Dow was ignited by the surprisingly strong GDP report for the third quarter. It was a healthy 3.5%, which was substantially stronger than the 3.2% that was widely expected. Of course, when the market realized that number was “juiced-up “on steroids from the stimulus, the market dropped almost 250 points the next day. But, nobody noticed some other…
During the 1990s, our trade deficit averaged about 2% of GDP but started rising in 2000. In December of 2006, I wrote this was not sustainable and possibly dangerous, as it approached 5% of GDP. The latest figures show it has decreased to only 3% of GDP and hopefully still dropping. One reason is the weakening dollar makes our imports more expensive and our exports…
That’s how the President referred to yesterday’s unemployment release that another 263 thousand Americans lost their jobs. Since the recession began in December of 2007, over 7.2 million people have lost their jobs. Even 54 thousand government jobs disappeared last month! And, we are many months away from any good news. Unemployment improves only after the economy improves. If this is a “double-dip” recession, jobs…