Archive for August 27th, 2012

The streak rolls on: BLS under-reports initial unemployment claims … again!

August 27, 2012

Still again …

Now we’re up to 75 out of 76 weeks — and, at least 16 weeks in a row — that the BLS’s “headline number” has under-reported the number of initial unemployment claims … and cast the jobs situation as brighter than it really is.

Based on last Thursday’s BLS report, the number for the week ending August 17 was revised upward from 366,000 to 368,000.

In itself, the 2,000 isn’t a big deal.

But, in context it is

Again, I ask: statistical bias or political bias?

If the former: fix it already, BLS.

Hint to BLS: just add 2k or .8% to your prelim forecast !

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* * * * *

Almost forgot … the preliminary unemployment claims for the week of Aug. 18 are up 6K vs. the Aug. 11 preliminary number and up 4K vs the revised Aug. 11 number.

In other words, no indication that a corner has been turned.

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Posted in BLS, Employment - Jobs, Statistical Bias, Unemployment | Leave a Comment »

Whatever happened to the housing crisis? … Hint: It’s still there.

August 27, 2012

Remember the hysteria around dropping home values, slow real estate sales, and frenetic foreclosure rates?  All legit concerns.

May be my selective attention, but I don’t hear much about the housing crisis these days.

Maybe because deeply depressed prices have stopped sliding.

Maybe because all of the government’s silver-bullet programs have failed to move the needle.

Hmmm.

Reality: still a big overhang from the housing bubble needs to be absorbed.

Here’s a rough calibration of the problem, based on the below Fed chart.

Before the bubble. people were putting about $450 billion per quarter into Private Residential Fixed Investment, i.e. houses.

Eyeballing the chart, during the period 2001 and 3009, PRFI averaged about $650 billion per quarter… about $200 billion per quarter over “normal”.

$200 billion times 36 quarters = $7.2 Trillion in excess … or “overhang”.

In the past 3 years, we’ve been running about $100 billion below the pre-bubble “normal” … in effect, absorbing about $1.2 trillion of the overhang (12 quarters times $100 billion).

Bottom line: still have over 80% of the bubble to absorb.

Ouch

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When the subject comes up again — and it will — remember to revisit my longstanding idea for unleashing private capital to buoy the housing market. It doesn’t cure the overhang problem, but provides some price relief and liquidity to the market.

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Posted in Housing - Mortgages, Private Residential Fixed Investment - PRFI | Leave a Comment »

What’s the government’s GPA?

August 27, 2012

A Kaiser Foundation survey asked folks to grade the government on a traditional A to F grading scale.

Back in 2000, the government scored a “gentleman’s C” … GPA = 2.07.

In the past decade, the GPA has dropped to 1.63 … a C-minus / D-plus.

Hmmm.

Isn’t that probationary at most b-schools?

 

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Source question

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Posted in Gov't Waste & Inefficiency, Government & Politics, Government Angst, Kaiser Foundation | Leave a Comment »

Check your coat? … How about your cell phone?

August 27, 2012

Punch line:  An LA restaurant is offering diners a 5% discount to check their technology at the door and actually talk to each other while dining instead.

* * * * *

Excerpted from brandchannel.com’s “To Cell or Not – While Dining Out”

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The escalating battle over digital displays in public has reached new heights…or lows…depending on your position on personal freedom versus a modicum of civility.

Between texting, tweeting and Instagram-ing restaurant meal photos, “distracted dining” is the latest scourge on the most basic of manners, the art of face-to-face conversation.

Eva Restaurant … in Los Angeles is offering diners a five percent discount on their bill to check their tech at the door.

“For us, it’s really not about people disrupting other guests. Eva is home, and we want to create that environment of home, and we want people to connect again,” said owner/chef Gold.

About half the customers … take the discount. “I think … they like the idea of actually talking to each other again,” adds Gold.

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Posted in Cell phones, Food & Drink, Restaurants | Leave a Comment »