Relevant and even prescient commentary on news, politics and the economy.

Biden’s Crappy Economy . . .

JOLTS report shows stabilization in almost all metrics for May  – by New Deal democrat The JOLTS report for May showed most metrics continued to show a slight rebounding from their March lows. The overall picture for now appears to be one of stabilization, consistent with the fabled “soft landing.” To the data: job openings (blue […]

June manufacturing rebounds, May construction spending declines to (only) slightly negative

 – by New Deal democrat As usual, the month starts out with important data on manufacturing and construction. There was bad news and good news. The bad news is that both were negative. The relatively good news is that they were so slightly negative as to be essentially flat. First, the ISM report on manufacturing […]

Real income and spending in May a nice rebound, but watch the caution flags in manufacturing sales and goods spending

 – by New Deal democrat Personal income and spending, in addition to the jobs report, has become one of the most important monthly reports I follow, mainly because I am looking for signs that the contractionary effects of Fed tightening are finally taking effect. To cut to the chase, this month’s report was mainly positive, […]

House prices – especially for existing homes – compared with wages remain near or at all-time highs, so existing homes make up less of the market

 – by New Deal democrat One item I meant to address with this week’s existing and new home sales data was the relative difference in price in the two, and the effect on the relative share of the market.  I am following up now because yesterday Kevin Drum put up a post yesterday in which […]

New home sales and prices continue range-bound in May, while new homes *for sale* make a 15 year high (and that’s good!)

 – by New Deal democrat We finished housing data for the month with this morning’s report on new single family home sales and prices. As I usually point out, new home sales are the most leading of the housing construction metrics, but they are noisy and heavily revised.  That was true again in May. Sales (blue […]

FHFA and Case Shiller repeat sales indexes show YoY price growth has peaked; slow deceleration in shelter CPI should continue

 – by New Deal democrat This week’s data focuses on house prices and new home sales, and the more important personal income and spending report on Friday. In the housing data I am looking at any movement towards rebalancing between new and existing home sales. To recapitulate, the big increase in mortgage rates has locked […]

Travelin’ man

New Deal democrat at The Bonddad Blog takes a vacation day. On the road again . . .   Fortunately, there’s no significant economic news today, so a perfect day to play hooky. See you tomorrow.

Snail’s pace of housing market rebalancing, as existing sales remain range bound, and inventory has not increased enough to relieve pricing pressure

 – by New Deal democrat Existing home sales have very limited value in economic forecasting, since they are the trade of an existing product rather than indicating growth or contraction in the creation of a new product. Thus my main focus at present on this data is the extent to which it shows – or […]

Housing permits and starts the lowest since 2020, units under construction also decline further, but no yellow caution flag yet

 – by New Deal democrat I’ve written repeatedly in the past few months that I am paying especial attention to the manufacturing and construction sectors for signs of weakness now that the supply chain tailwind for the economy has ended. At the beginning of this month, one show appeared to have dropped, as the ISM […]

Jobless claims still positive for forecasting purposes; the unresolved seasonality issue should be resolved shortly

 – by New Deal democrat This morning’s jobless claims report continued the uptrend we’ve seen for the past month. But it still looks more likely than not that it is mainly unresolved post-pandemic seasonality. We’ll probably get a more definitive answer to that issue in th next several weeks. Initial Jobless claims declined 5,000 for […]