Economics Roundtable
Calculated Risk
Read the Bill McBride interview.
Jobs
The best summary of the state of our economy is the graph (below) of employment as a fraction of population for people over 16 years old. The decrease is large, but the most troubling feature of the graph is the flat trend .
Click on the image to get a bigger version.
June Payroll Employment
The slowndown in employment growth over the past few months is starting to become more apparent in the graph below.
Click on the image to get a bigger version.
Focus on the Problem
U.S. payroll employment peaked at 132.5 million jobs in February 2001. For April 2012, U.S. payroll employment had reached 133.0 million jobs, marking the third month in a row above the February 2001 level.
Click on the image to get a bigger version.
Graph-of-the-Year Candidates
Donald Marron likes European interest rates. Click on the image to get a bigger version. Can you find three distinct subperiods?
Brad DeLong favors the U.S. gdp gap.
Finally, it's hard to argue against the payroll employment graph below (straight from FRED) and the comparison across recessions (courtesy of Calculated Risk).
Looking Up At 2001
In February 2001, U.S. payroll employment peaked at 132.5 million. The November 2011 figure of 131.7 million still falls 800,000 jobs short of the earlier peak.
Click on the chart for a larger version.
Remember M1?
Money Supply M1 growth is now over 20% per year over a 12 month lag. M1 growth has touched 20% before, but not with excess reserves of $1.6 trillion. Where is M1 headed?
Click on the chart for a larger version.
EconModel
The Economics Roundtable is sponsored by EconModel.
The Classic Economic Models cover micro, macro, and financial markets.
DataPoints: The Dismal Scientist
"A free and open exchange on the economy, and other things.”
by Moody’s Economy.com, a division of Moody’s Analytics.
Employment growth missed expectations in March, raising fears of a stalling recovery. Mark Zandi discusses the data with CNBC.
ADP's data could be showing the effect of a slowdown in post-Hurricane Sandy rebuilding. Mark Zandi discusses with CNBC.
Monetary policy
The Federal Reserve continues to pursue an aggressively easy monetary policy in response to an economy that is operating well below its potential as is evidenced by an unemployment rate above 8%, inflation that is near the Fed’s 2% target, and unsettled global financial markets. Currently, policymakers do not ...
What are equity markets predicting for Europe and the U.S. economy? Mark Zandi interprets the signals for CNBC.
The following appeared in The Philadelphia Inquirer Sunday, Aug. 26.
Look at all ideas on fixing Medicare
by Mark Zandi
Mitt Romney's choice of Rep. Paul Ryan as his running mate put Medicare front and center in the presidential debate. Ryan's Medicare plan, largely endorsed ...
September will be a critical month for Europe as policymakers attempt to finally get ahead of the crisis. Mark Zandi discusses with CNBC.
Over at NPR's Planet Money, David Kestenbaum and Mark Zandi work the models to see what it will take to bring down the U.S. unemployment rate to pre-recession levels. Their not-very-encouraging conclusion:
The economy just can't grow fast enough to absorb the backlog. Zandi says ...
The latest job creation numbers undershot expectations. What does that mean, and what happens next? Mark Zandi discusses on MSNBC.