Free Republic

If you had any questions about how differently the economy will be covered with Barack Obama in the White House they were answered by George Stephanopoulos on Sunday when he credited the president-elect with causing the recent stock market rally as well as better than expected sales the day after Thanksgiving.

In his book "The Progress Paradox: How Life Gets Better While People Feel Worse," Gregg Easterbrook, senior editor at the New Republic and contributing editor to The Atlantic, castigates the media for dwelling on minor problems without celebrating the broader, more upbeat context in which they exist. One of the broader, more upbeat events of recent years is the significant and dramatic increase in real GDP per-capita worldwide. Using world GDP data from the IMF and world population data from the U.S. Census Bureau, the chart above shows real world GDP per-capita from 1985 to 2013 (data from 2008 -...

Last week, assembled at Miami’s InterContinental Hotel for a meeting of the Republican Governors Association, the governors seemed cheerful. The G.O.P. had lost only one statehouse on Election Day. The prospects for a Republican pickup in Virginia in 2009 were decent, and good candidates were plotting runs in states like California, Pennsylvania and Ohio in 2010. There was even a sense of liberation in the air. For the last 14 years, there has been either a Republican Congress or a Republican White House, or sometimes both. Now the Republican governors are free of those heavy taps on the shoulder from...

DALLAS (January 21, 2008) – As Congress debates whether to renew tax cuts enacted early in the George W. Bush presidency, as well as various economic stimulus plans, critics often label the measures as "tax cuts for the rich." Yet a new report from the National Center for Policy Analysis (NCPA) says the Bush tax cuts made the tax code more progressive, no matter how progressivity is measured. In fact, the report concludes that every major tax change (Republican or Democrat) over the past two decades has increased the share of taxes paid by the wealthiest Americans. The top 1...

DOW currently down 561 points.

Stocks rallied Monday afternoon, with the Dow up over 800 points during the session, as investors bet that the worst of the credit crisis is over, following a series of global initiatives announced over the last few days. The Dow Jones industrial average (INDU) gained as much as 814 points and over 9% before pulling back a bit. The advance was the largest ever during a session on a point basis.

<p>Bloomberg television states Bush to address the public later this morning.</p> <p>Bloomberg states: “Bush to assure the American Public he’s going to do all he can.” Now there a confidence building snippet.</p>

US administrations typically suffer temporary loss of international influence as their time in office draws to a close. But rarely has Washington’s global prestige and leverage fallen so low as in the dog days of US President George W. Bush’s eight-year reign. This debilitation is a source of concern for the US’ friends — and a dangerous opportunity for its enemies, who hope such weakness can be both exploited and made permanent. The US-triggered economic crisis has reinforced hostile perceptions of US vulnerability. Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad gleefully invited Iranians to listen to the sound of global power crashing to...

"I'm ill about the position that America is in and that we have to look at a $700 billion bailout. At the same time we know that inaction is not an option and as Senator McCain has said unless this nearly trillion-dollar bailout is what it may end up to be, unless there are amendments in Paulson's proposal, really I don't believe that Americans are going to support this and we will not support this," Palin said in the interview. Couric pressed Palin on examples of how McCain, a 26-year congressional veteran, had led the charge for more oversight. The...

Eager to show that he feels people's pain, President Bush told the country Thursday his administration is working feverishly to calm turmoil in the financial markets. With reports swirling of possibly imminent new government action, the president met with his treasury secretary and the head of the Federal Reserve. Nothing was announced immediately after the 40-minute meeting at the White House, which included Securities and Exchange Commission Chairman Christopher Cox, along with Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson and Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke. White House spokesman Tony Fratto would not comment on whether any decisions were made at the session, or whether...

Bad day for Wall Street

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Consumer confidence soared unexpectedly to an eight-month high in September as lower fuel prices soothed inflation fears and made Americans more hopeful about the economy, a survey showed on Friday. The Reuters/University of Michigan Surveys of Consumers said its preliminary index of confidence jumped to 73.1 in September, the highest since January, from 63.0 in August, for the biggest monthly jump since January 2004. September's reading was well above economists' median expectation of 64.0, according to a Reuters poll. The sunnier mood can be traced mostly to lower prices at the gas pump and consumers' one-year...

Unemployment Rate Hits 5-Year High As Economy Continues to Shed Jobs By BRIAN BLACKSTONE September 5, 2008 9:27 a.m. WASHINGTON -- The U.S. jobless rate unexpectedly jumped in August to a nearly five-year high as employment fell for an eighth-straight month, raising the risk of recession as households face a struggling labor market and high inflation. The data, which included a modest rise in wages, suggest Federal Reserve officials will hold interest rates steady when they meet later this month and at subsequent meetings through the end of the year. Nonfarm payrolls, which are calculated by a survey of establishments,...

<p>Second-quarter GDP revised up to a surprising 3.3% annual growth; initial jobless claims declined last week. More soon.</p>

Inflationary pressures were subdued, the data showed, with real hourly compensation falling -- a hopeful sign for the fight against inflation, but troubling for economic growth. Productivity in the nonfarm business sector rose a 2.2% annualized rate in the second quarter, a bit slower than the 2.7% rate that economists surveyed by MarketWatch had been looking for. See Economic Calendar. Unit labor costs -- a key gauge of inflationary pressures from labor markets -- rose 1.3% compared with the 1.6% rate expected by economists. Output rose an annualized 1.7% in the quarter, while hours worked dipped 0.5% and real hourly...

US retail sales in surprise climb Consumers spending is the biggest driver of the US economy. US retail sales climbed by the largest amount in six months during May after spending was helped by tax rebates. Sales rose by a better-than-expected 1% in May, the Commerce Department said, the largest rise since November. It also said April's figure had been revised up to a rise of 0.4% against the previous estimate of a 0.2% fall. Economists said the rise indicated that the economy had been given a boost by the stimulus package under which millions of Americans got tax...

The $48 billion in tax rebates sent out to American consumers this spring has helped keep the US economy out of a recession, but analysts believe the impact may only be temporary. The rebates, approved by Congress earlier this year, helped push May retail sales up at twice the expected rate. But consumers are still facing rising gas costs, falling home prices and the struggling job market, so the rise is probably short-term, says Mark Zandi, chief economist for Moody's Economy.com. "Come October, there are probably going to be weaker numbers," Zandi said. "People are spending the rebate checks very...

Former Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan said on Thursday that the worst of the credit crisis is over, according to attendees at a New York speech. Greenspan also said house prices still had a long way to fall and it was unlikely they would stabilize by year-end, according to meeting attendees who provided Reuters details of the speech delivered at the Alternative Public Strategies Conference. The attendees, who declined to be identified by name, said Greenspan mentioned that U.S. growth was likely to be sluggish for an extended period of time. The U.S economy is reeling from a housing-led slowdown,...

I once heard Rush Limbaugh say the way he deals with a recession is to “not participate in it.” Today we found out that in our current so-called recession, the economy itself is not participating. You’ve heard, of course, about the “recession.” The Associated Press has been referring to it as an established fact for much of the year. Every day, we see interviews with economists who grimly warn that we are surely already in a recession. The only debate is how bad it will get. Oops. Some facts just arrived, and they’re not what the media, the economists and...

AND NOW, FOR SOME GOOD NEWS: THE OTHER SHOE isn't going to drop. After a winter of discontent marked by massive write-offs on Wall Street and a wilting economy on Main, America's portfolio managers have declared that the worst is over. More than half of the institutional investors participating in our latest Big Money poll say they're bullish... More than 55% of pros think stocks are undervalued, and most plan to boost their holdings... Much has changed since we took the pros' pulse last October, little for the better. Oil is up, profits are down, credit's constrained and a major...

NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- Employers made their deepest cut in staffing in almost five years in February, the Labor Department reported Friday. There was a net loss of 63,000 jobs, which is the biggest decline since March 2003 and weaker than the revised 22,000 jobs lost in January. Economists had forecast a gain of 25,000 jobs. The weak report fueled already mounting recession fears and is likely to keep the Federal Reserve cutting interest rates further when it meets later this month. "Based on today's Employment Report, if we are not in a recession, it is a darned good imitation...

FOR YEARS, AS the economy has boomed, the permabears have said recession is just around the corner. They've been wrong. Now there's a little bit of evidence of an economic slowdown, and those same bears are declaring victory — they're saying the recession is right here, right now. We shouldn't be too surprised at a bit of a slowdown here. After all, despite the housing downturn, 2007 was a high-growth year by and large. It wouldn't be out of pattern to have to give back a little for a couple quarters just in the normal cycle of things. And with...

Following last week’s solid jobs report, the New York Times got back to its Bush-bashing recession mantra with the front-page headline: “Slowing Growth and Jobs Seen as Ominous Sign for the Economy.” This chant has been going on for quite some time. Doom and gloom from the economic pessimists has been political sport for seven years, even though the Bush boom just celebrated its sixth anniversary. The current expansion is now in its 74th month — 17 months longer than the average 57-month business cycle since World War II.

(2007 Grocery Manufacturers Association/Food Products Association Fall Conference) Renaissance Hotel Washington, D.C THE PRESIDENT: Thanks for coming. Thank you all. Please be seated. Billy, thank you. I asked Billy where he works. He said, well, I run Sunny Delight beverage company. I said, well, Billy, I quit drinking. (Laughter.) He said, that's not that kind of alcohol. I thank you all for having me. Billy, thank you for your kind words. He's from Cincinnati. I was in Cincinnati the other day, stopped off and got some ribs, and he tried to ask me to compare Texas ribs with Cincinnati ribs....

A batch of economy-wide stats was released Friday morning (Sept. 14), covering retail sales, industrial production, import prices, and consumer confidence. The verdict? It's a 2 percent economy. Call it Goldilocks 2.0. Might the current financial turmoil throttle back growth a little more in the next six months? Yes, perhaps. Will there be some negative earnings surprises, especially from financial companies? Sure. But the bears would have us believe the sub-prime credit virus heralds the end of the world. They are wrong. Remember this: Our free-market capitalist economy is resilient and durable. It has proven time and again that it...

NEW YORK (AP) -- American consumers -- shrugging off a struggling housing market as jobs remained plentiful -- became more confident in July and sent a gauge of sentiment to a six-year-high, a private research group said Tuesday. The New York-based Conference Board said that its Consumer Confidence Index, rebounded to 112.6, its highest level since August 2001 when it recorded a 114.0 reading. That compared to a revised 105.3 in June. The July 24 cutoff for the preliminary survey of 5,000 U.S. households was before last week's stock market tumble, however. "An improvement in business conditions and the job...

THE $US100-a-barrel oil that Goldman Sachs said would prevail by 2009 may be only a few months away as its price runs away on global markets. Jeffrey Currie, commodity analyst at the world's biggest securities firm, says $US95 crude is likely this year unless OPEC unexpectedly increases production.

Newman is a good actor. I really liked him in "The Sting" when I was a high school kid. I didn't get to many movies at that age, what with football, baseball, basketball and chores, but that movie is one I'll never forget. Great ending. "Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid" was another of his better efforts. "Cool Hand Luke," "Fort Apache, the Bronx," "The Towering Inferno," "Slap Shot," all good stuff. He makes a tasty salad dressing, too. But Newman's politics aren't nearly as appetizing. I wish he'd stick to what he knows. The legendary star of the silver...

NEW YORK (MarketWatch) -- The Dow industrials ($INDU$INDU ) crossed over the 13,000 level in intraday trading for the first time Tuesday, about six months after besting the 12,000 mark. The Dow had topped 12,000 for the first time in intraday trading on Oct. 18 -- it closed above that mark on Oct. 19 -- and it took 127 sessions for the blue chip barometer to reach the next 1,000-point milestone. The Dow has now gained 4.3% since the end of 2006 and 15% over the last year

NEW YORK - It looks like a cause for celebration: The Dow Jones industrial average surged from 12,000 to 13,000 in just six months. But appearances can be deceiving, and there may be more reason to worry rather than rejoice about Wall Street's latest accomplishment. Stronger-than-expected profits from several large companies helped push the stock market to historic heights. But many big corporations, including the Dow components, made a chunk of that money overseas, where economies are growing faster than in the U.S. And many of the same worries that weighed on investors earlier in the year remain: rising energy...

It's increasingly clear that much of our standard economic vocabulary needs revising, supplementing or at least explaining. The customary words we use don't fully convey what's actually happening in the real world. Let me illustrate with two basic economic terms: inflation and recession. There are also larger lessons. Start with inflation. You may have noticed that last week's release of the March consumer price index — the government's main inflation indicator — inspired much optimism. "Inflation Fears Relax," headlined The Wall Street Journal. Stock prices jumped on the supposedly good news. But if you actually examined the CPI report, you...

Jobless rate falls to five-year low The unemployment rate fell to a five-year low of 4.4 percent as job growth picked up to 180,000 last month — a show of strength that bolstered hopes that the economy will endure the turmoil in the housing and mortgage markets without major harm. The March increase in jobs reported by the Labor Department reflected a revival of hiring among construction companies, department stores and retailers as well as continued robust growth of health care jobs. The construction job gains erased a big loss in February resulting from cold weather and left jobs in...

A higher-than-expected 180,000 nonfarm jobs were added in March while payrolls for the prior two months were revised higher, the Labor Department reported Friday. The unemployment rate unexpectedly fell to a five-year low of 4.4% in March from 4.5% in February. The consensus expectation was for nonfarm payroll growth of 135,000 (down from 150,000 a week ago) and for the unemployment rate to tick up to 4.6%. February payrolls were revised up to 113,000 from 97,000 while January payrolls were revised up to 162,000 from 146,000. Average hourly earnings rose 0.3% last month, in line with expectations. Average hours worked...

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- A severe flu pandemic "would almost certainly lead to a major economic recession," according to a new report from a nonpartisan, nonprofit organization. The report, titled "Pandemic Flu and the Potential for U.S. Economic Recession," projected that a pandemic would kill 2.25 million people and force 87.75 million people to miss work for three weeks That could cause the U.S. gross domestic product to drop more than 5.5 percent, resulting in an economic loss of $683 billion.

Parsing through a dozen or so newspapers and websites this morning, I was stunned not to find a single reference to the very strong economic state of the union. ...snip..... I did manage to find one article, buried deep in The Wall Street Journal, titled "Class of '07 Gets Plenty of Job Offers." It talked about employers planning to hire 17 percent more graduates this year than they did last year. This happens to top the college-hiring peak of the last economic boom in 2000. There's also an interesting op-ed by Deputy Treasury Secretary Bob Kimmet (an old friend with...

Why do young private companies want to sell out now instead of becoming public corporations? After all, the potential long-term gains for a founder for owning a chunk of stock in a large corporation are far greater than those from a quick sale. To understand this sudden desire to pump and dump, put yourself in the entrepreneurs' shoes. Looking ahead at a possible IPO for your hot little start-up, all you see are minefields of legal precedents and new regulations created after the dot.com boom. Not least -- but worst -- there is the Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002, whose self-monitoring...

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Strong U.S. job growth boosts GOP hopes Republicans worried about losing their congressional majorities in Tuesday's elections say the data justify their economic policies. By Joel Havemann Times Staff Writer November 4, 2006 WASHINGTON — Providing welcome news to Republicans four days before congressional elections, the government reported Friday that jobs grew at a strong pace in the last three months, pushing the unemployment rate to its lowest level in more than five years. The October jobless rate was 4.4%, down from 4.6% in September and the lowest level since May 2001, President Bush's fourth full month in office.

The Dow industrials closed above 12,000 for the first time Thursday as investors took in a mixed bag of earnings from leading banks, blue chips and tech companies. "The economy continues to weaken. But everyone is convinced the Federal Reserve will be able to engineer a soft landing," said the president of one brokerage. The Dow crossed the 12,000 milestone for the first time Wednesday but failed to finish above that number.

Good morning to all, I am watching Fox News Channel, and the Dow has crossed 12,000. As of this type, it is up 90.61 at 12,041.99. Of course, it is changing faster than I can type it, so I'll let those more qualified than me, keep up with it.

NEW YORK, Oct 18 (Reuters) - U.S. stock futures rose on Wednesday, lifted by a string of positive earnings reports by tech companies and after an unexpected rise in housing starts, coupled with benign inflation data. Shares in companies including Intel Corp. (INTC.O: Quote, Profile, Research), Yahoo Inc. (YHOO.O: Quote, Profile, Research) and IBM Corp. (IBM.N: Quote, Profile, Research) rose before the bell in composite trading and in Europe after they reported solid financial results or outlooks. JPMorgan Chase & Co. (JPM.N: Quote, Profile, Research), the third largest U.S. bank, said its third-quarter net income rose sharply on record investment...

S. stocks edged higher on Monday as positive assessments of the economy and an advance in energy shares boosted by rising oil prices outweighed downgrades of Dow components Home Depot Inc. and General Electric Co. Recent company assessments and government data have underscored the notion that the U.S. economy is stronger than expected heading into the end of the year and that companies will post another quarter of double-digit earnings growth. Crude oil futures (CLc1) rose 1 percent, pulling energy stocks such as Exxon Mobil Corp. (NYSE:XOM - News) 1.9 percent higher to $69.67 on the New York Stock Exchange,...

Dow 11,801.14 73.80 Nasdaq 2,272.05 28.40 S&P 500 1,343.18 9.07

WASHINGTON -- The last time the Dow Jones industrial average closed at a record high, America was living in a giddy economic era when good times and budget surpluses seemed as if they might continue indefinitely. It was Jan. 14, 2000, the start of another year, another century and another millennium. The economy was roaring along. The jobless rate was a low 4 percent. The "new economy" of young entrepreneurs energized markets with new tech companies that didn't turn a profit. Nobody seemed to care, and excesses piled on top of excesses.

NEW YORK (AP) -- Investors bid stocks higher Wednesday after the Labor Department reported tame inflation figures for the second straight day, boosting Wall Street's confidence that the Federal Reserve would keep interest rates steady. The consumer price index, which measures price increases at the retail level, rose 0.4 percent in July, slightly higher than June's 0.2 percent increase. But with food and fuel prices removed, so-called "core" CPI rose just 0.2 percent, less than the 0.3 percent economists expected. Combined with Tuesday's producer price index, which showed a decline in core wholesale prices, the data points to a drop...

On August 1, 2003, Nancy Pelosi asked a question: “Where are the jobs Mr. President?”. Of course you have to have had selective amnesia to make such a statement. The Market Crash of 2000, The Clinton Recession, The 9-11 Attacks, and the Cost of Waging a War on Terror all affected the job market. Nancy Pelosi Press Release on August 1, 2003. Where Are the Jobs, Mr. President? Washington, D.C. -- House Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi released the following statement today on the Bureau of Labor Statistics' announcement that 470,000 people abandoned their job searches in July and that 3.2...

Mr. Bush signed the most recent tax cuts into law in the spring of 2003. In the past 33 months the size of America's entire economy has increased by 20%--or, as National Review Online's Larry Kudlow put it, "In less than three years, the U.S. economic pie has expanded by $2.2 trillion, an output add-on that is roughly the same size as the total Chinese economy." In the 2 1/4 years before the 2003 tax cuts, economic growth averaged 1.1% annually; in the three years since it has averaged 4% per year, and in the first quarter of this year...

Unexpected tax revenue to shrink U.S. budget deficit By MarketWatch Last Update: 3:35 PM ET Jul 8, 2006 NEW YORK (MarketWatch) -- An unexpected spike in revenue from corporate taxes, individual stock market profits and executive bonuses is curbing the projected budget deficit this year, according to a media report. The White House on Tuesday is expected to say that tax receipts are about $250 billion higher than they were a year ago, rising twice as fast as the administration forecast, the New York Times reported Saturday. As a result, the budget deficit will be about $100 billion less than...

WASHINGTON (AP) - The economy grew at its hottest pace in 2 1/2 years in the opening quarter of 2006 but signs suggest it has cooled since then. The Commerce Department reported Thursday that economic activity expanded at a 5.6 percent annual rate in the January-to-March period. The revised reading on gross domestic product was an even stronger showing than the 5.3 percent pace estimated for the quarter a month ago. The new estimate -- based on more complete information -- matched economists' forecasts. The stronger GDP figure mostly reflected an improvement in the country's trade deficit, which was much...

Economy Zips Ahead at a 5.6 Percent Pace Jun 29 8:45 AM US/Eastern Email this story By JEANNINE AVERSA AP Economics Writer WASHINGTON The economy sprang out of a year-end rut and zipped ahead in the opening quarter of this year at a 5.6 percent pace, the fastest in 2 1/2 years and even stronger than previously thought. The new snapshot of gross domestic product for the January-to-March period exceeded the 5.3 percent growth rate estimated a month ago, the Commerce Department reported Thursday. The upgraded reading _ based on more complete information _ matched economists' forecasts. The stronger GDP...