The 2020 Presidential and Senate polling nowcast: partisan positions continue to harden Here is my weekly update on the 2020 elections, based on State rather than national polling in the past 30 days, since that directly reflects what is likely to happen in the Electoral College. Remember that polls are really only nowcasts, not […]
Housing roars back As I wrote yesterday, the background longer term fundamental factors for the economy, most importantly all-time low interest rates, are very positive. In particular I wrote, this “has already made an impact on the housing market…Lower mortgage rates cause more people to buy houses. Housing permits have already made back about half of […]
Coronavirus dashboard for August 19: a regional look at infections; the Deep South remains almost totally out of control Total US cases: 5,457,824 Average last 7 days: 48,764 Total US deaths: 163,595 Average last 7 days: 1,048 Source: COVID Tracking Project My overall thesis is that under the present leadership the US as a whole […]
Initial claims mixed, while continuing claims continue “less awful” pandemic recovery trend While this morning’s initial jobless claims increased from last week, they were better than any other readings since the pandemic started. Continuing claims had their “least worst” week yet. On a non-seasonally adjusted basis, new jobless claims rose by 52,776 to 891,510, […]
Why, in the face of the worst US economy since the Great Depression, is the stock market near record highs? As I type this, the S&P 500 is close to setting an all-time record. Last week it came within 0.2% of doing so: All of this in the face of the worst quarterly decline in […]
The 2020 Presidential and Senate nowcasts: Positions are getting entrenched, and spreading down-ticket Here is my weekly update on the 2020 elections, based on State rather than national polling in the past 30 days, since that directly reflects what is likely to happen in the Electoral College. Remember that polls are really only nowcasts, not forecasts. […]
Industrial production and retail sales both improve strongly in July, suggest further gains in employment This Friday morning two important indicators for July, with implications for future employment, were released: retail sales and industrial production. Retail sales for July increased 0.8% on an unadjusted basis. After adjusting for inflation, they rose 0.7%. In the past […]
Initial and continuing claims: the most “less awful” so far This Thursday morning’s initial and continued jobless claims continue the trend of “less awful” numbers that resumed last week. New jobless claims, which fell to under 1,000,000 for the first time on an unadjusted basis last week, declined about 150,000 further to 831,856 (red in […]
July inflation consistent with early recovery; no compelling evidence of wage deflation Yesterday morning July consumer prices were reported to have increased 0.6% for the second month in a row (as did core inflation, ex-food and energy): As a result, YoY inflation has increased to 1.0%:
Did July’s headline jobs number miss business closures, and so overcount job gains? A few issues arose with regard to last Friday’s jobs number; in particular, the effect of government jobs in the form of Census and teaching jobs, whether seasonal adjustments are unhelpful at this time; and whether the birth/death model used by the […]