The primacy of the monetary pyramid in 2015 is not really about money as it is all ideology. If you believe that monetary policy provides “stimulus” then you immediately remove all thoughts of any economic decline during times when monetarism is most active. Since “it works” then all else must fall into place. Contrary indications are thus given extraordinary lengths [...]
Every once in a while it is heartening to think that world’s people may finally be awakening from their economic anesthesia and experiencing rightful revulsion about what has occurred. We are told that the global economy fell on its own into a pit of despair in 2008 and has been unable to escape it all “despite” the best efforts and [...]
As distasteful as it can be, there will be, I believe, a necessary condition whereby closer examination of Paul Krugman’s writings and rantings is fruitful. The rise of Keynesian doctrine, more specifically the re-rise, seems to be more and more prevalent especially as the global economy careens out and away from all the trillions in monetarisms that have been perpetrated [...]
Filing the following under general government “panic”, the Japanese government in the wake of a confirmed recession in 2014 (where only recovery was supposed to exist) is preparing more “stimulus.” Analysts welcomed the size of the new package, saying it will support the world's third-largest economy at least partially when the tax hike kicks in. The government estimates that the [...]
There was not much good news from China last night, particularly as there were no PMI releases to allow the media and economists to project uncorrelated optimism. Everything from industrial production to retail sales came in under “estimates”, with industrial production in October particularly worrisome as the second worst month (only better than August) since 2008 and the depths of [...]
Thomas Carlyle, Scottish philosopher, coined the phrase “dismal science” in economics to describe his inability to get the slaves in the West Indies to conform to any rational order of thought about the subjects. Supply and demand never held that men should be so subjugated when in fact Carlyle believed, as so many “experts” did, that certain men should. The [...]
In light of second quarter GDP’s imminent release and the explosion of commentary it will undoubtedly create, I thought it useful to promote a better context that includes all pertinent variables of analysis and judgment. As I said earlier today on CNBC with Rick Santelli, it is often overlooked that the US economy has been undergoing “stimulus” courses for just [...]
March household spending in Japan surged by 7.2% Y/Y, the highest spending growth rate since 1975. That level even beat out March 1997, the month before the previous and similar tax hike. Extrapolating from that one number, there is now more hope that the Japanese economy may be able to withstand April’s tax intrusion without an economic disaster like that [...]
Not to revisit Minsky too much, but the crux of the idea is that debt saturation is finite as it can never be uniformly or dynamically efficient. The Chinese seem very much intent on “proving” that idea (as if it needed even more empirical confirmation). Last year Chinese authorities, through various channels, wanted the world to know without a doubt [...]
So Q2 GDP wasn’t a complete disaster; that was left for Q1. Even at 1.7% (intangibles and imputations everywhere) the string of GDP fragility is deafening, particularly in the face of the combined psychology of QE 3 & 4. Since Q2 2012 was revised significantly higher, I can no longer officially proclaim that GDP growth has been at or under [...]
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