Submitted by CARPE DIEM
Monthly industrial production for January was released today by the Federal Reserve, and it was 2.3% above its January 2007 level (see graph above, click to enlarge). Industrial production is important because it is one of the recession-indicating variables watched by the National Bureau of Economic Research to determine the onset of […]

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Submitted by Businomics Blog
John Rutledge posted on his blog a neat chart showing, state by state, foreclosures as a percent of home sales.  The bad news: in 2007, foreclosures constituted over 10 percent of home sales in California, Colorado, Nevada, and Tennessee.  Here’s his chart:

This reinforces, once again, that the real estate problem is not […]

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Submitted by CARPE DIEM

Detroit News — Sales of residential and condominium units in Detroit nearly doubled in January, compared with the same month a year ago, and the region overall got a nearly 15% bump. The city of Detroit led the gainers, posting a 45.5% increase in the month, with 736 closings.
Seven realtors who […]

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Submitted by CARPE DIEM

ECONOMIST — You won’t hear the R-word much in the modest governor’s mansion in Helena. The occupant, Brian Schweitzer, insists that Montana’s economy is in better shape than it has ever been. It has had one of the fastest rates of job growth in the country. The state is prospering on the […]

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Submitted by CARPE DIEM
Obama’s rising odds over the last 30 days on Intrade.com (currently about 70%):
And Hillary’s falling odds (currently about 30%):

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Submitted by CARPE DIEM
While outsourcing is generally recognized as a strategy for producing cost savings, few surveys to date have utilized a large enough sample of respondents to provide an accurate estimate of the actual amount of these savings. Deloitte Consulting has attempted to overcome this by surveying a group of 300 executives who are […]

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Submitted by A Dash of Insight
The courtroom oath, “The truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth,” is a good test for articles in the blogosphere and in mainstream media.
We have suggested that investors have a difficult task in sorting through the available information.  Today’s trader commentary was a good example.  Bernanke highlighted actions […]

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Submitted by Econbrowser
Earlier this week, I explained why real estate prices, rather than interest rates or credit workouts, are the critical determinant of how bad the foreclosure problem is going to become. Today I discuss some of the alternative measures of real estate prices that we might look at, illustrated using the latest numbers for […]

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