Good news and bad news on personal income and spending – by New Deal democrat December personal income and spending had some material for both optimists and pessimists. Let’s look at the good news first, mainly having to do with inflation. Both the total and core personal consumption deflator continued their overall deceleration in December, […]
Q4 2022 GDP positive, but both long leading components continue negative – by New Deal democrat Here’s my last note for this morning. Real Q4 GDP came in at +0.7%, or +2.8% annualized. While this is lower than most quarters in the past several years, as shown below: Although not shown (due to the huge […]
The 2023 ACA Open Enrollment Period is the best ever. The prime reason being the expansion of enhanced premium subsidies, first introduced in 2021 via the American Rescue Plan. ACA premiums became less costly for those who were already qualified. The lower pricing of ACA plans resulted in the expansion of eligibility to millions who were […]
Three most quickly reported measures of coincident indicators – all of which are close to turning negative – by New Deal democrat While we await tomorrow morning’s deluge of Almost Every Economic Series Imaginable, I have posted over at Seeking Alpha a detailed look at one measure of consumer spending and two of employment which will give […]
I am waiting to see what the courts dish out for the insurrectionists who thought it was kind-of-“kool” to attack the Senate and House while in session certifying the 2020 presidential election vote. The insurrectionist sitting at Nancy Pelosi’s desk was sentenced last week. He claimed he was looking for a bathroom. So far, I […]
How “FHFA-CPI” using house prices rather than OER shows a sharp deceleration in inflation – by New Deal democrat Paul Krugman made another foray into the “inflation is mostly gone” genre over the weekend with a thread on Mastodon that largely relied on the following graph: concluding that “[A]t this point the burden of proof lies on […]
Existing home sales and prices decline; plus, a closer look at multi-unit housing construction – by New Deal democrat I will keep my comments on December existing home sales and prices brief. That’s because, even though they make up about 90% of the total market, they have much less economic impact than new home construction. […]
The actual Big News in this morning’s housing report was – positive – by New Deal democrat For the second month in a row, the biggest news in the housing report was not in the headlines. Most of what you are going to read is about how bad housing permits and starts were, and that […]
Jobless claims continue their string of good news – by New Deal democrat If yesterday’s economic data was bad, this morning’s was considerably better (I’ll post on housing construction later). Initial jobless claims declined 15,000 to 195,000, tied for their best number in almost 8 months. The 4 week moving average declined 6,500 to 206,000, […]
And the King of Coincident Indicators rolls over – by New Deal democrat This morning’s second big – and big negative – report was for industrial production, the King of Coincident Indicators (I call it so because historically, it more often than not marks the exact month +/-1 that a recession begins or ends). In […]