Recession Looms: GDP Revised Down to 1.3%, Durable Goods Collapse 13%
Because the media-narrative for the next 40 days must be, Obama can do nothing wrong and Romney can do nothing right -- the corrupt media will sure focus on the fact that today's jobless claims were lower than expected at 359,000 (which you can only celebrate on a curve). But there's potentially catastrophic news in the economy today with two leading indicators that point towards a coming recession.
Our 2nd quarter GDP has just been
revised downward from an already anemic 1.7% to a shockingly weak 1.3%.
Moreover, orders for durable goods went -- as Hot Air's Ed Morrissey points out -- "over a cliff," collapsing a full 13%.
Morrissey also reports that this is the single largest decrease in over
four years and that a subsequent increase in inventories this month
means demand won't be improving any time soon.
UPDATE 1: The AP tells us things are bad and they're not going to get better:
The 1.3 percent growth in the spring followed a sluggish 2 percent growth rate in the first quarter, rates too slow to lower unemployment. The unemployment rate was 8.1 percent in August. Most expect it to stay around 8 percent for the rest of this year because they anticipate little pickup in growth.Before Thursday's revision in the April-June figures, the consensus view was that the economy expanded in the July-September quarter at a lackluster pace of between 1.5 percent to 2 percent. They expected the final three months of the year will be about the same. For all of 2011, the economy grew 1.8 percent.
What the AP fails to highlight, though,
is that our economy is slowing, from 2.0% in the first quarter of the
year to 1.3% the second quarter.
Here's the GDP growth chart
going back to the beginning of 2008. As you can see, in the last
quarter of 2011, we hit a 3% growth rate. But ever since, the trend,
like job creation, is down, down, down....
UPDATE 2: AEI's Jim Pethokoukis says we have entered into a "recession red zone."
Bottom line: Growth the past two quarters has averaged about 1.6%. Not only does this mean the economy is growing more slowly than last year’s 1.8%, it is also slow enough to signal about a 50% chance of a recession within a year. And the third quarter also looks weak.
The anemic, three-year-old U.S. recovery is already running out of steam. And if it does, it many be several more years before we see unemployment below 8%.
Yesterday, I saw a memorable bumper sticker that read: A Vote For Obama Is Like Backing Up the Titanic and Hitting the Iceberg Again.
Funny metaphor for what a vote for Obama really means: A lost decade for America.
Keep checking back. We will fill in this post as more news arrives….
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Media Ignore Independents' Swing Toward Romney
Not long ago, Independents were the go-to demographic for determining who would win elections. How the Independents swung, so too would the election.
In 2008, Barack Obama carried Independents in Ohio by 8 points and in Florida by 7 points. That victory among Independents contributed a great deal to his 2.8-point win in Florida and his 4.5 point win in Ohio. A victory by Romney among Independents could tilt both key states in his favor.Curiously, Independents seem to be mostly ignored this election cycle, and their presidential vote preference is almost unanimously ignored by the MSM. Instead, “women” have replaced Independents as the key demographic. This emphasis and sudden fascination conveniently ties in nicely with the Democrats’ fictitious “War on Women” meme.
In both Ohio and Florida, Barack Obama’s “clear leads” all come from heavy over-sampling of Democrats, not from winning the crucial Indie vote. In fact, most of the polls that show Obama with big leads also show Romney handily winning Independent voters. Yet, somehow, Obama manages to increase his performance from 2008 despite Independents now opposing him. Let's take a look at how Romney is competing among Independents in recent polls:
Ohio – Leads Among Independents
Ohio Newspaper Organization – Romney +28
CBS/NYT/Quinnipiac – Romney +1
American Research Group – Romney +16
Fox News – Romney +4
We Ask America – Romney +3
Public Policy Polling – Romney +2
Florida - Leads Among Independents
CBS/NYT/Quinnipiac – Romney +3
Gravis Marketing – Romney +4
We Ask America – Romney +2
American Research Group – Romney +1
Florida Times Union – Romney +4
Fox News – Obama +2
Remember, these are states Obama won by small margins in 2008, primarily by winning Independents by 7 and 8 points. If Barack Obama were winning with Independents in every poll, it’s clear the media would be talking about it just as they did, to the point of annoyance, four years ago.
Independents make up roughly one third of the electorate, and one would think they might get a little attention this time of year just as they do every other election year. If Romney turns the Independent vote his way like these polls suggest, his chances of winning turnout in even Florida and Ohio are excellent. But the reality is that the way Independents are now voting simply doesn’t mix with the media’s tidy narrative that Obama is running away with the election in key battleground states.
¿Ya no le dan una cuenta bancaria gratuita? Agradézcaselo a la Ley Dodd-Frank
Las cuentas gratuitas, en su momento consideradas como algo común y corriente, se están volviendo cada vez más escasas a medida que los enormes costos de las nuevas regulaciones se van notando en los resultados finales de los bancos.
Según el recientemente publicado Estudio de Cuentas Gratuitas de 2012 de Bankrate, Inc., una publicación de información financiera, sólo el 39% de los bancos continúa ofreciendo cuentas gratuitas, un fuerte descenso desde el 76% de los bancos que ofrecía cuentas gratuitas en 2009, antes de la promulgación de la gigantesca ley de regulación financiera Dodd-Frank.
El estudio de Bankrate, que analizó alrededor de 500 cuentas gratuitas, también encontró que el promedio del saldo mínimo requerido para evitar pagar una cuota mensual subió un 23% el año pasado, hasta los $723.02 para las cuentas que no generan intereses.
El salto en las cuotas de servicio no resulta sorprendente, pues las nuevas regulaciones les cuestan a los bancos miles de millones de dólares cada año. La culpa la tienen las regulaciones que incluyen restricciones sobre las cuotas por descubiertos y por los controles del precio de las cuotas que los bancos tienen permitido cargar a los comercios minoristas por gestionar las transacciones con tarjetas de débito. La avalancha de cientos de regulaciones más debidas a la ley Dodd-Frank también está teniendo su costo. Y dichos costos se tienen que compensar de alguna manera.
Según Bankrate, casi todas las cuotas de las cuentas estudiadas se han incrementado, algunas con una subida del 25% o incluso más. Para las cuentas corrientes que devengan intereses, el promedio del saldo mínimo necesario para no tener que pagar cuotas se ha duplicado en los dos últimos años, hasta los $6,117.80, mientras que el promedio de la cuota de servicio mensual ha subido a los $14.75.
Las cargas por descubiertos y las cuotas aplicadas al consumidor por utilizar cajeros automáticos de una red distinta a la de su banco también se han incrementado. El uso de un cajero automático de otra red cuesta ahora un promedio de $4.07 por operación.
Aunque se ha vendido como “favorable para el consumidor”, la ley Dodd-Frank y otras regulaciones de los servicios financieros en realidad les están costando dinero a los consumidores. La pérdida de las cuentas gratuitas es sólo uno más de los muchos problemas causados por esta regulación tan mal concebida.
