THE RECESSION OF 2008: Live team coverage

And away we go ....

Unemployment spikes to 5%:
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/05/business/05econ.html

The stage is set for '70s-style stagflation:
http://www.smartmoney.com/decode/index.cfm?story=20080103

Our brethren are losing jobs left and right, individually or otherwise:
http://www.sportsjournalists.com/forum/threads/51301/
http://www.sportsjournalists.com/forum/threads/51273/
http://www.sportsjournalists.com/forum/threads/51115/
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But Britney's in the nuthouse, so never fucking mind.

 

GDP increased 4.9 last quarter and 3.8 the previous quarter. We aren't quite headed for a recession yet, sir.

 

The thing that bugs me about GDP is that it counts EVERYTHING.

Which means it includes debt.

Spend $800 billion in Iraq with no means of paying for it . . . good for GDP.

Carry a $15,000 balance on your credit card . . . good for GDP.

Purchase a $55,000 BMW that you can't afford . . . good for GDP.

http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/features/1999/9903.rowe.growth.html

It's an old article, but the principles still apply. Maybe even moreso since debt was not as much of a problem back in 1999.

 

Would the Iraq spending be included?

I thought the only military spending included in GDP was the military-industrial complex, etc.

 

Good question. Do not rightly know.

But whenever the defense budget is addressed as being too high, someone else will point out that it's "only" x.x% of GDP (which is usually a reasonably low number, compared with history).

That makes it sound like GDP includes it. But I do not know for sure.

 

Time for the "D" word.

 

If you peek out the window, that black helicopter will swoop down upon you.

 

Catchy thread title. I think you are right about stagflation. I think more startling than rising unemployment is the under employment and low wages. Also, real estate used to be a great place to park your money during a recession -- not any more. It'll be interesting.

 

As the Chinese have long loved to say, "May you live in interesting times."

They don't smile, when they say it.

 

The unemployment rate during Clinton's first four years:

1993 6.91%
1994 6.10%
1995 5.59%
1996 5.41%

But all the reporting back then was about how great times were.

Now, as the unemployment rate creeps toward 5% coming off a quarter where the GDP growth was 4.9%, (it averaged 3.5% in the Clinton years) a depression is obviously coming.

Ridiculous. Actually, a very simple way to avoid a depression would be to start selling tin foil hats to all those suffering from BDS about now.

 

You just shot yourself in the foot on this one.

Look at the TREND. It was 7.5% when he was elected in 1992 . . . 5.5% four years later . . . and 3.9% four years after that.

There is only one way to accomplish that: massive job creation. I will never forget the job report from February 1996: 700,000 jobs created in one month.

So, with 22 million jobs created . . . and the stock market going up 300 percent . . . and inflation and interest rates held in check . . . and a balanced budget . . . and the number of people on welfare declining . . .

. . . yes, the reporting on the economy was generally positive.

 

Clinton won on the lie of "worst economy in 50 years when in actuality 1992 was a year of growth after a recession in 1991 -- which was before anyone had even heard of Clinton. And it was a recession caused by Bush I's breaking of the no-new-taxes pledge.

Bush II, on the other hand, inherited a recession that was then greatly exacerbated by 9/11. Then from late 2002 on we had great growth and falling unemployment. That "trend" was always ignored.

A ton of reporting on the "bad" economy in 1992. Absolutely no reporting on the bad economy of 2000.