Unpopular Cures for Unemployment and Economic Depression

So far, so good.

Things keep happening, more or less as they should.

That is, the US and European economies keep falling apart. And the fixers keep failing to put them back together again.

Just as we expected.

Trying to fix a depression it is not only expensive…. The US government spends $1.60 for every $1 it receives in taxes. This is a recipe for a disaster, not for a recovery.

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Giving Up on the Economic Recovery

The fight for recovery is over. The feds have waved the white flag. Maybe…

The Labor Department came out with the latest employment numbers last week. They were atrocious. Only about a fifth as many new jobs as economists expected. Which shows you three things.

First, economists can’t really predict levels of employment, growth, prices, or anything else. And they are especially bad at it when they have the wrong idea of how things work.

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Giving Up on the Economic Recovery

The fight for recovery is over. The feds have waved the white flag. Maybe…

The Labor Department came out with the latest employment numbers last week. They were atrocious. Only about a fifth as many new jobs as economists expected. Which shows you three things.

First, economists can’t really predict levels of employment, growth, prices, or anything else. And they are especially bad at it when they have the wrong idea of how things work.

[Read more...]

US Dollar Reverses Losses After Jobs Report

Well… Friday was quite interesting with the Jobs Jamboree falling flat on its face, and watching the dollar get sold…and then bought again as the day went on… The dollar holds the hammer again this morning, as now the media and market observers are going after Italy… So the offset to the dollar, the euro (EUR), is slip-sliding away… Slip-sliding away, the nearer your destination, the more you’re slip-sliding away…

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The Continuing Delusion of Economic Recovery

“The people will be crushed under the burden of taxes,
loan after loan will be floated; after having drained the
present, the State will devour the future.”

– Frédéric Bastiat, French libertarian economist, 1850

Stocks managed to eek out a bit of a rally yesterday. The Dow was up nearly 100 points by the session’s close. (Approximately equal to the amount it gave back within the first sixty seconds of trading today.) Gold, meanwhile, is up $8 over the past 24 hours. An ounce this morning goes for just over $1,540. And bitcoins…they’re back to $14.50 a piece. Hmmm…

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The Successful Failure of US Money Printing

Dow down again – 25 points. Gold up again, $7. And oil still below $100.

Inflation worries up, in other words.

Economy down.

And now it’s official. QE2 is a FLOP! See below…

To hear the papers tell it, US stocks are being weighed down by troubles in Europe. Here’s the report from The New York Times:

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US Payrolls Jump Up Thanks in Part to “Ghost Jobs”

The US payroll numbers came in much better than expected on Friday, helping the dollar continue its rebound versus most of the currencies. American employers added 244,000 jobs in April according to the Labor Department, exceeding last month’s revised 221,000 jobs and easily beating economists’ projections. But a separate report showed that the jobless rate climbed to 9% – the first increase since November of last year. Chuck was scratching his head after the release of the jobs data on Friday morning, and sent me this to include in this morning’s Pfennig:

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Predictions of the Gold-Silver Ratio

Today, traders are celebrating that the U.S. economy added the most jobs in nearly a year. Or so they’re led to believe. Let’s examine the payroll data first:

  • The economy supposedly added 244,000 jobs in April. The private sector added 268,000 jobs; government cut 24,000
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Predictions of the Gold-Silver Ratio

Today, traders are celebrating that the U.S. economy added the most jobs in nearly a year. Or so they’re led to believe. Let’s examine the payroll data first:

  • The economy supposedly added 244,000 jobs in April. The private sector added 268,000 jobs; government cut 24,000
[Read more...]