Submitted by Businomics Blog
In Businomics, I used the boat building industry as a case study for estimating an industry’s vulnerability to recession, and also for an example of an early warning system.  (You can view the vulnerability study or the early warning system example.
Today the AP ran a story about boat sales being down, companies […]

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Submitted by The Capital Spectator
It’s been tempting to think that maybe, just maybe, the U.S. could avoid recession. Perhaps some divine financial power might intervene and pull the economic coals out of the fire. But such hope, however remote in the first place, should now be packaged away in the file cabinet that holds all […]

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Submitted by unsettling economics
I have been teaching for almost 40 years at a modest, but comfortable salary. I have been thinking that I should figure out a way to lose a few billion dollars so that I can get rewarded with a few million for my efforts.
If anybody wants to contribute to my […]

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Submitted by Econbrowser
I’ve been invited to give the keynote lecture at the Society for Nonlinear Dynamics and Econometrics Annual Symposium next week at the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco. I plan on presenting results of some ongoing research with Mike Owyang of the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis on regional propagation of business […]

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Submitted by CARPE DIEM

DALLAS–The Texas jobless rate dropped to 4.1% in February – a low not seen since the mid-1970s, the Texas Workforce Commission reported Thursday (see chart above).
“Texas has once again reached a prominent benchmark – a more than 30-year record low for unemployment,” newly appointed Texas Workforce Commission Chairman Tom Pauken […]

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Submitted by CARPE DIEM

According to the CNN poll above (click to enlarge), only 21% of the rebate will actually be spent, reducing the potential effectiveness of the fiscal stimulus by almost 80%.
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Submitted by CARPE DIEM
Update: The chart above shows the National Association of Realtors’ Housing Affordability Index (HAI) from 2005 to Feburary 2008 (annual averages for 2005 and 2006, monthly in 2007 and 2008), based on the national median-priced home, median family income, and the 30-year fixed mortgage rate.

The HAI has gone from 103.6 in July […]

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Submitted by A Dash of Insight
There was quite a bit of commentary on yesterday’s Wall Street Journal article on The Lost Decade for stocks.
Our view is that readers of this article should give it a careful and critical look, examining the evidence and the conclusions.  We think that many investors will uncritically accept the basic […]

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