Posted on 12/31/2025 9:48:20 PM PST by SeekAndFind
In an August 1 interview with Fox News, Peter Navarro, Director of President Trump’s Office of Trade and Manufacturing, argued that President Trump should get the Nobel Prize in Economics:
Basically, President Trump has taught an economic lesson to the world. In real time, in the real world, he’s taught that the biggest country and biggest market in the world can impose tariffs in order to address blatant cheating and do it in a way which increases the growth of the United States without inducing inflation… I never read that in the textbooks when I was getting my PhD in economics, but that’s the way the world works.
U.S. economists who predict numbers before their release were caught by surprise on December 23 when the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) reported that the U.S. Gross Domestic Product (GDP) rose by 4.3% in the third quarter (July through September), much faster than the world’s other economies according to the Trading Economics website on 12/29/26:
Image created by authors using referenced data.
Even though GDP growth had been falling when Trump took office, it has been rising since, as shown by data published by the BEA:
Image created by authors using referenced data.
The BEA discussed the third quarter preliminary economic growth numbers in terms of the five components of GDP. The rise in exports and fall in imports provided the biggest boost:
(Excerpt) Read more at americanthinker.com ...
That's just goofy. Inventories could increase in anticipation of increasing sales or a falloff in sales. They could decrease because of accelerated sales. And so on. It's a lousy metric.
Actually, if we read textbook on international trade, at least 2 Nobel Prize winners in Economics have already provided the theoretical framework for it. First is Ribert Mundell, and second the leftist darling Paul Krugman.
Mundell theory specifically divide the treatment for small countries that cannot dictate prices and large countries that can.
Krugman talks about how large countries need to expand the economic of scale and their abilities to influence other countries by various mean, including tax policies.
Journalists and not so well-informed economists or those who are well informed but hate it never mentioned abouy it.
Even Krugman has to argue that theory is different from reality when being questioned about his inconsistencies.
But it’s only one of the metrics - why do so many on FR insist on pi$$ing on Trump?
Why are so many posters paranoid about protecting Trump that they presume I'm pi$$ing on him? I was addressing the BEA.
Because you are so ignorant you don’t know that you are pissing even though your leg is wet
Crybaby
The gyrations in the GDP number during the past several years have been driven by the (quirky) way GDP accounting handles “net exports” and now also by changes in “inventories.”
On the other hand, the 4-part index of coincident indicators of the Conference Board have been showing approximately steady increases since the reopening of the economy in 2021.
https://www.conference-board.org/topics/us-leading-indicators/
The increases in the index of coincident indicators have been in spite of the turn down on the index of leading indicators since 2022.
There is something quite dramatic going on, and this predates Trump taking office. Obviously, since Trump has been president for 11 months, he now owns the performance of the economy.
Looking at some of the detail of the index of leading indicators, first the big negatives: consumers remain in the dumps. In spite of things actually getting better, consumers feel that the sky is falling. Also, new orders for manufactured goods are down.
Now the big positives in the index of leading indicators: the stock market continues to boom and credit continues easy. These two things suggest we’re in a bubble economy fueled by rapid money growth.
The thing about bubbles is that they continue until the bubble is pricked. Assuming we’re in a bubble, what could prick the bubble? Most probably, the Federal Reserve abruptly tightening money. The thing is, the Federal Reserve has been careful to not do anything too weird in attempting to lower inflation.
So, here we are with high interest rates (even with recent cuts) and inflation running a bit higher than the long run goal of 2 percent, along with a vibrant economy.
I am starting to think as long as we continue down this path of making incremental progress on the deficit along with making incremental progress on inflation and interest rates, that what might be a bubble becomes the new reality.
Or maybe I’m just being sucked into the bubble.
But Orange Man BAD!
“Why are so many posters paranoid about protecting Trump that they presume I’m pi$$ing on him? I was addressing the BEA.”
Apologies - the reason is because so many here actually are pi$$ing on him.
Yet manufacturing is in the doldrums despite GDP, Inflation, and Stock Market gains. Is that a lagging indicator or does it matter as we are doubling down on AI ?
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