Obama and Bernanke are economic fools

[rwh11385]

just a few observations from an uneducated (in macro-economics) observer-

-rwh uses very frequently "if", "could" and rhetorical questions to support his viewpoint.

Um, what did you expect? Someone claiming they know exactly what the future holds even when we didn't know we weren't going to "go off the fiscal cliff" until after time had run out? Or what Congress was going to do or not do on Friday? Or if they will be able to be grown ups and come to a deal by the end of the month, again?

If you want someone to lie and say they know what will happen for certain I can give you George's number. I mean, he promised that the country was in a recession Q1 2012 and see how that turned out. He also projected the S&P500 would end at 1200 in 2012.

It's important to know what has and is happening, but the future is all conjecture. People find it useful to know the best and worst cases and most likely so they can make strategic plans. However, that's part of the problem since there is so much uncertainty because of Congress being absolutely jackasses.

The economy is going on despite them, not because of them. But that's not necessarily bad if citizens realize that they control their world and lives, so people rely on government less to help them and do more themselves, or help others more themselves. Instead of complaining and wanting to lobby their representative for X, they just make it so on their own. I'd feel better if the economy was much less dictated by the government's inability to make decisions.

Big if's remain about what government and the country will do about its growing retired population and young people finding careers, especially since education is important and Gen Y's parents encouraged them towards any degree and away from technical skills (even if they are in demand now). Our education systems need work - particularly re: dropouts, need to be more like the Germans. Our healthcare costs too much and that drives deficits. We are projected to meet our own energy demand in the future, which was the hopes and dreams of GWB - decrease our dependence on foreign oil. We can choose as well to put aside the stupid conflicts from our two party system and work to make America better, or can bitch and moan like a lot of people do.

- oil company revenues hardly equate to increasing individual Americans' prosperity, and in my opinion should not be counted as 'manufacturing". whatever, they do not become part of the tax base as much as is implied.

Um, do you call turning a tree into furniture manufacturing? Iron ore into a car manufacturing? Crops into food? Why not crude oil into value-added gasoline and other fuels?

http://www.forbes.com/sites/christopherhelman/2012/04/16/which-megacorps-pay-megataxes/

Exxon Mobil paid $27.3 billion in 2011, Chevron $17.4 billion, ConocoPhillips $10.6 billion.... that's quite a bit. How much did you expect?

-ditto Apple and IBM inasmuch as the money to support their labor and manufacturing costs goes to china.

Their contract manufacturing may be out of the country, but the real value is here (and most of the value means most of the $$$). And IBM makes a lot from a lot of labor in technology consulting, not just sales of hardware. They paid $4B and $4.2B in taxes respectfully. Again, kinda makes the Big Oil seem to pay quite a bit, no?

The point was that even just a handful of companies dominate most countries, and those are just the largest. If you've never been to a Caterpillar plant maybe you don't understand the reality of American industry... and that's sad that people carry such ignorance in their viewpoints.

- in my industry, technology and innovation have increased productivity at the cost of relatively well-paying jobs. a specific example is CAD. there are no entry level drafting jobs anymore; one civil engineer/cad operator can do the job of 5 or better old school drafters in addition to his engineering responsiblities. again, shrinking the tax base.

Oh no, complain about productivity and improved ability of technology... I'm just you are singing to the choir of switchboard operators. We can engineer more today, optimize more efficiently, and design solutions we couldn't imagine before... and you are complaining?

Do you assume that because people can do 5x as much as before there will be only 1/5 as many CEs? Because the BLS outlook would disagree with you: http://www.bls.gov/ooh/architecture-...-engineers.htm "Employment of civil engineers is expected to grow 19 percent from 2010 to 2020, about as fast as the average for all occupations. Job openings for civil engineers are expected to be numerous through 2020."

- the 'cupandhandle' chart shows a projected ratio of debt/gdp decrease for 2012-2017.
rwh seems to use these projections as fact.

Um, where is that exactly? I posted the chart to show that a country can reduce its debt/gdp ratio by reducing its spending and also growing its gdp (shrinking nominator / growing denominator). My statements about current trend of deficits was based on the CBO link I posted. Maybe go back and read again dude.

-and lastly, and to the point of this thread, the precipitous decline of debt/gdp after WW2 is most closely matched by the steep increase that represents the tenure of our Dear Leader. post war it decreased from 120% to less than 80% in 5 years. considering that the administration does not think this country has a spending problem it seems unlikely that trend is anywhere in our near future.

Why say "our Dear Leader"? Just want to shout to the forum that you are a nut, or what? How effective is George's calling Obama messiah? The attack underlines the bias in the post as well as a lack of actual foundation.

The steep increase actually is most from revenue drop because of the financial crisis which was caused by many factors, from politicians wanting to push more people into houses to drive up demand, people spending more than they made, and financial advisors like George selling people mortgage-backed securities by misleading them about how they were a sure thing.

But I also mentioned the root of the deficits before:

http://www.americanprogress.org/issu...years-deficit/

Instead of taking a shotgun to spending using a plan that was intended to be so bad that people would have to grow up and compromise, we should find savings in things that really are redundant or wasteful, be smarter about how government operates, have organizations help people up out of welfare programs with success, improve further the HS graduation rates, promote technical schools as well as colleges, inform kids of the solid careers for the future, support research and development, get our nation healthier through work wellness programs or just common sense, fix medical malpractice defense habit of running unnecessary tests through reform, have a more efficient military that is sustainable, etc. etc.

Or people could still act like idiots and we get to keep seeing if Congress can make the deadline before government shutdown every few months, without actually having the guts to deal with the actual needed reforms - making mandatory spending solvent rather than complaining about tiny discretionary aspects. But standing up to the AARP is scary to politicians since old people are reliable voters.

[gwb72tii]

I'm going to guess that Patrick would prefer someone who is not full of himself like you are George and isn't a pro at misleading others. And I'm positive that you are instead the one who the forum calls bullshit on. (Or is do you think that it is everyone else that is crazy when they all chime in against you??)

I'm not sure randomly posting funds and numbers impresses anyone, nor rambling off people's names, nor the one time you decided to list all the possible asset classes you could think of. People generally like the truth (not calling 2.2% sub-2%) and good reasoning supported by logic, not biased hatred of a politician. But hey, you gig might work with wrinkled up angry people who are like you.

wow
you started this, inserted your foot/pulled your head out of your ass and then tried to make me look wrong based on a 2 month ROR.
that's how you judge success now?
what a tool

turf can make up his own mind

you, apparently you're stuck on stocks. bravo!! enjoy the underperformance!!

and yes, the market performed much better than i had thought it would in 2012, and the economy better as well. does that mean being out of stocks (mostly) was the wrong investment posture? nope. being out of stocks for the most part has lead to...........................drumroll............. ..............better performance than stocks. ha!

nobody, except perhaps you, invests on a 2 month time horizon, so trying alledging our performance this year is dismall is reaching, even for you. 2 months don't matter, and 1 year doesn't matter either. what matters is long term, if you have the patience to get to the long term.

and turf, if you're really interested, or not, google jeremy grantham. rwh would dismiss him as a perma-bear, or an old man too stupid to realize stocks are the answer to everything. somewhere he has had more good calls than bad as he manages $106 billion. or bill gross of pimco. he manages more than that. these folks are smarter than me or rwh, have battle scars to prove it, and generally are good reads if you can find their stuff on the net. or jeffery gundlach of doubleline. you'll get different opinions from each.

good luck!

[rwh11385]

wow
you started this, inserted your foot/pulled your head out of your ass and then tried to make me look wrong based on a 2 month ROR.
that's how you judge success now?
what a tool

turf can make up his own mind

you, apparently you're stuck on stocks. bravo!! enjoy the underperformance!!

and yes, the market performed much better than i had thought it would in 2012, and the economy better as well. does that mean being out of stocks (mostly) was the wrong investment posture? nope. being out of stocks for the most part has lead to...........................drumroll............. ..............better performance than stocks. ha!

nobody, except perhaps you, invests on a 2 month time horizon, so trying alledging our performance this year is dismall is reaching, even for you. 2 months don't matter, and 1 year doesn't matter either. what matters is long term, if you have the patience to get to the long term.

and turf, if you're really interested, or not, google jeremy grantham. rwh would dismiss him as a perma-bear, or an old man too stupid to realize stocks are the answer to everything. somewhere he has had more good calls than bad as he manages $106 billion. or bill gross of pimco. he manages more than that. these folks are smarter than me or rwh, have battle scars to prove it, and generally are good reads if you can find their stuff on the net. or jeffery gundlach of doubleline. you'll get different opinions from each.

good luck!

No, if you look at the OP of this thread, very clearly you are the one with your head up your ass - celebrating a briefly existing tiny contraction in the first estimate of 2012 Q4 GDP. You violated all the talk you posted about not being sure of anything because of revisions down the line and boasted about government spending cuts and businesses not restocking inventory because of fiscal cliff uncertainty as a think you enjoyed seeing. How much of an un-American permabear are you? Oh yeah, the kind that thought if people believed the economy was doing worse than it was would mean that a flake pandering to a shrinking party could win in November. Maybe if the GOP could get back in touch with reality they could win again. (Surprisingly Newt has been saying some intelligent thinks about lessons learned this election)

Congrats on finally being man enough to admit you were wrong about last year with the economy and stocks, that's a first.

Funny, WSJ had the article talking about how they expected bonds to underperform people's requirements and you never responded it to that I can remember, which I why I brought up your fund's sad start to the year. And funny the hypocrisy you not don't reflect on two months performance although celebrating two months into our bet? Which way is it? Oh well, do what you want with your clients money... but don't think that selling mutual funds means you know as much as you think you do about economics.

[gwb72tii]

rwh rwh
which is it? 2 months? 6 months? 12 months? 18? 24? 36?
this is why you're an economist. you're never wrong, you just interpret the data a different way LOL.
you're wrong on performance, you just can't admit it. man up dude. it's ok to be wrong once in a while.
am i lagging for the last two months. sure, on that one fund. congrats, you're THE man!!
am i lagging for 12 months? 24? 36? 48? 60? 120? 180? nope, you are, but you just cannot admit it. YOU ARE, any way you want to look at it.
so somehow outperforming stocks, taking 1/5 the risk of the s&p, having less downside and more upside translates into not knowing much about economics. LMAO

as i suggested, you should look into leveraged s&p ETF's

[rwh11385]

rwh rwh
which is it? 2 months? 6 months? 12 months? 18? 24? 36?
this is why you're an economist. you're never wrong, you just interpret the data a different way LOL.
you're wrong on performance, you just can't admit it. man up dude. it's ok to be wrong once in a while.
am i lagging for the last two months. sure, on that one fund. congrats, you're THE man!!
am i lagging for 12 months? 24? 36? 48? 60? 120? 180? nope, you are, but you just cannot admit it. YOU ARE, any way you want to look at it.
so somehow outperforming stocks, taking 1/5 the risk of the s&p, having less downside and more upside translates into not knowing much about economics. LMAO

as i suggested, you should look into leveraged s&p ETF's

And if you are wrong on one of the funds you post, you find another one with good performance and claim you were invested in it all along! Congrats. And focusing on a few individual well performing bond funds instead of all bonds in a childish argument about bonds vs. stocks? Who actually believes you when you mislead like that?

Are you not lagging for 12 months too? (I mean, if you are honest to your overall investments, not just cherry picking some funds after the fact)

not knowing what i'm doing, being full of bullshit, being short the s&p, being long bonds, taking 1/3 the risk of the market, has netted 9%, outperforming the dow and getting 85% of the s&p.
blind fucking luck, just like last year

9% doesn't sound too hot. And funny your fraction of risk keeps changing... do you lose track of your lies?

Being lazy and throwing money in VFIFX netted 15.58% in 2012 (It has some bonds, heh). Began putting money into it August 2011, so can't really compare prior to that but from then to year end was pretty good too) I also made about 50% on my money from July 09 to Feb 11 with VTI, VEU, VNQ... but I'm guessing you are gonna say that you bested that too, right?

[gwb72tii]

And if you are wrong on one of the funds you post, you find another one with good performance and claim you were invested in it all along! Congrats. And focusing on a few individual well performing bond funds instead of all bonds in a childish argument about bonds vs. stocks? Who actually believes you when you mislead like that?

Are you not lagging for 12 months too? (I mean, if you are honest to your overall investments, not just cherry picking some funds after the fact)

9% doesn't sound too hot. And funny your fraction of risk keeps changing... do you lose track of your lies?

Being lazy and throwing money in VFIFX netted 15.58% in 2012 (It has some bonds, heh). Began putting money into it August 2011, so can't really compare prior to that but from then to year end was pretty good too) I also made about 50% on my money from July 09 to Feb 11 with VTI, VEU, VNQ... but I'm guessing you are gonna say that you bested that too, right?

you really are a (insert descriptive term)
YOU brought up the two month window on some investment we don't use and frankly we've never heard of, so I corrected you to the fund we do use. and it's still behind the market this year, BUT THAT IS THE ONLY TIME PERIOD it has lagged you're beloved Vanguard fund or the market.
CONGRATULATIONS!!! you got me fair and square on a two month window.

and yes, if you can actually read the link I provided turf, you did lag in performance if you only made 50% on your ETF's.

[rwh11385]

you really are a (insert descriptive term)
YOU brought up the two month window on some investment we don't use and frankly we've never heard of, so I corrected you to the fund we do use. and it's still behind the market this year, BUT THAT IS THE ONLY TIME PERIOD it has lagged you're beloved Vanguard fund or the market.
CONGRATULATIONS!!! you got me fair and square on a two month window.

and yes, if you can actually read the link I provided turf, you did lag in performance if you only made 50% on your ETF's.

Really? In that time period it seems your TGEIX returns were under 40% based on what I just looked at. But correct me if I'm wrong and the performance is different in your head. (or just BS / forgetting reality)

I think you very clearly losing your mind.

btw, how are you liking your JPMorgan USD Emerging Market Bond Fund now? What - down almost 3% YTD? S&P500 up 6.2%. Are you still shorting the S&P500 from ~1300?? How much money did you lose on that move?

and we don't use the morgan stanley Em MKT fund, we use TGEIX, but you would need $1MM to buy in. LOLOLOLOL our average account gained 9.6% last year with NO equity exposure. that would be 90% of the DJIA and 60% of the s&p500TR index, with 20% of the volatility.

Or just plain full of it.

here's a few numbers for you to chew on, and no i'm not going to link you. you say your a smart guy so if you doubt the numbers, they are easy peasy to find

[...]

2012
s&p 500 16.00
jp morgan emerging market bond 18.53
plus this is the single best category for the last 1,3,5,7,and 10yr time periods

[...]

Is this year YTD is the only time I outperformed? Or are you misleading people by trying to claim your managed accounts didn't lose to a simple old Vanguard fund?

you're wrong on performance, you just can't admit it. man up dude. it's ok to be wrong once in a while.
am i lagging for the last two months. sure, on that one fund. congrats, you're THE man!!
am i lagging for 12 months? 24? 36? 48? 60? 120? 180? nope, you are, but you just cannot admit it. YOU ARE, any way you want to look at it.
so somehow outperforming stocks, taking 1/5 the risk of the s&p, having less downside and more upside translates into not knowing much about economics. LMAO

Unless 9.6% > 15.58%, I'd say that you are lagging and not man enough to admit it. Or are you confused? Or just lying (at the very least to us if not also to yourself)

[rwh11385]

So George, after months of watching the ISM reports and getting gitty if it was at 49.x% and cheering against the economy, did you see the non-manufacturing one today?

http://www.latimes.com/business/money/la-fi-mo-ism-service-economy-20130305,0,2414594.story

The service sector, the major driver of the U.S. economy, expanded in February at its fastest pace in a year, according to a leading private barometer released Tuesday.

The Institute for Supply Management's non-manufacturing index rose to 56 last month from 55.2 in January.

The increase exceeded expectations of analysts, who had expected the widely watched purchasing manager's index would be little changed.

Last month's reading was the highest since the index registered 56.1 in February 2012. It dipped to a low of 52.7 in June and has averaged 54.5 over the past year.

A figure above 50 indicates the sector is expanding. February was the 43rd straight month of service sector expansion, dating to just after the Great Recession technically ended in mid 2009.

The data follows ISM's report last week that manufacturing sector growth also increased in February, expanding at its fastest pace since mid-2011.

Both indexes came ahead of Friday's February unemployment report. Analysts expect the government to say the economy added 160,000 new jobs, continuing the recent moderate growth.

Respondents to ISM's monthly survey indicated business activity and production, new orders, employment and inventories were expanding.

Business Activity Index at 56.9%
New Orders Index at 58.2%
Employment Index at 57.2%

http://articles.marketwatch.com/2013-03-01/economy/37362867_1_tops-forecast-new-orders-component-marketwatch

The Institute for Supply Management's manufacturing index accelerated in February, climbing to a reading of 54.2% from 53.1% in January. That came in ahead of the MarketWatch-compiled consensus of 52.5% and represents the third straight expansion. The new orders component was particularly strong, climbing to 57.8% from January's 53.3%.

It's stupid that Congress sucks and is doing what it can to shoot the country in its foot, but at least the rest of the economy is trying its best to move along.

[gwb72tii]

rwh get a grip
you're so fucking full of rage you've lost it
the jp morgan emerging market bond IS A FUCKING INDEX, NOT A FUND.
read the post in context you dolt. and quote me in context. you talk in circles, change subjects, and pull shit like the above. you're fucking ignorant.

i've mentioned more than once i don't give a shit about out performance of anything, neither do our clients. they're smarter than you. they're older than you. they'd laugh at you if i told them about your sorry ass posts.

you brought all this shit up again with your post about how fuckall smart you are because you silly ass fund beat emerging market bonds for 2 months. 2 MONTHS. 60 DAYS. 60 days out of 15 years you've done better than emerging market bonds. all hail the next coming of the investment guru

you're a genius. a fucking investment genius. maybe you should manage money rwh since you're so smart. but then again you be accountable to your clients, unlike cheap ass economic opinions that change with the wind.

EAD

[rwh11385]

rwh get a grip
you're so fucking full of rage you've lost it
the jp morgan emerging market bond IS A FUCKING INDEX, NOT A FUND.
read the post in context you dolt. and quote me in context. you talk in circles, change subjects, and pull shit like the above. you're fucking ignorant.

i've mentioned more than once i don't give a shit about out performance of anything, neither do our clients. they're smarter than you. they're older than you. they'd laugh at you if i told them about your sorry ass posts.

you brought all this shit up again with your post about how fuckall smart you are because you silly ass fund beat emerging market bonds for 2 months. 2 MONTHS. 60 DAYS. 60 days out of 15 years you've done better than emerging market bonds. all hail the next coming of the investment guru

you're a genius. a fucking investment genius. maybe you should manage money rwh since you're so smart. but then again you be accountable to your clients, unlike cheap ass economic opinions that change with the wind.

EAD

Ha, the irony is stifling. Read what you posted and what I post and ask anyone who seems to be full of rage. Or talking in circles. Or change subjects when they are stuck. For someone who supposedly doesn't care about outperformance, you sure do talk about it A LOT. (And only downplay it when you underperform) Are you just going to keep looking back into history to find when you mattered? Clearly you do not have the ability to give good economic insight like you would have liked to believe last year.

And sorry for confusing you and incorrectly including the word "fund" which prevented you from understanding and supposedly making you think I was talking about Morgan Stanley. [There is actually a fund and an index: so just saying "jp morgan emerging market bond" could be taken as JEDAX or EMBI, although the index had a lower return than the fund last year but they perform similarly and by that I mean not great so far YTD] Are you saying you couldn't understand what I was referring to? Are you changing subjects and focusing on me including a word incorrectly instead of addressing the subject you're avoiding? Pretty petty of you.

And I'm fairly sure your clients would be ashamed of you if they knew how immaturely you argue with people and how many wrong calls you made. Certainly they will see if bonds don't perform this year as how much as they'd like how much you are really worth. Your argument against Vanguard's approach was that advisors get better performance and worth their fees, but now you don't care about performance? Interesting talking in circles, as usual. What are you good for again?

Why would I manage money? [I actually considered being a FA once - briefly - but couldn't stand the notion for more than a passing moment] There's better things to do to make a difference in the world than simply attempting to transfer wealth from other people to your clients. (Or like you do, talk down to others and try to convince them that FAs are the only people who should be capable of understanding what you do) I like to discuss economics because it's interesting and fun, but find it funny that as a hobby I've made better calls than you and you supposedly do it for a living. [As much as you assume, I'm not an economist nor ever had been... although I did minor in economics] Clearly you have some need to attempt to prove your importance to the world and that you matter, or that people should listen to you... but all the threads have shown you aren't worth paying the attention you so desperately seek.

You know this all started when you attempted to swing into the thread about unemployment and show off how better you knew about the economy - and that no one else could possibly have a foundation to disagree with the Mighty George. Again, look in the mirror for all of what you are projecting on me and see that you are actually the angry and egotistical one. I hope that someday you will be able to act more mature and have a civil conversation based on facts and logic, but I'm not going to hold my breath.

[gwb72tii]

btw, how are you liking your JPMorgan USD Emerging Market Bond Fund now? What - down almost 3% YTD?

the anger is with you and you're ignorance and trying to make yourself look smart, even when you step on your dick.......again....and again.....and again

you have no clue what you're talking about, and the sad part is your ignorance is going to cause youngsters like turf to lose money, and then you'll deny it, cause that's what you do. you'll just accuse turf of beinf stupid, which is your favorite method of inflating your ego

you had no clue it was an index, you just assumed it was a fund. so you felt smart enough to ridicule my investment "choice" when in fact you don't know what you're talking about. pants down, step on dick.

so please, tell the board again why 60 days of underperformance relative to the s&p 500 INDEX matters. why stocks have been better. why your supposed investment expertice should be afforded any credibility WHEN YOU DON"T KNOW WHAT YOU"RE TALKING ABOUT

[rwh11385]

the anger is with you and you're ignorance and trying to make yourself look smart, even when you step on your dick.......again....and again.....and again

you have no clue what you're talking about, and the sad part is your ignorance is going to cause youngsters like turf to lose money, and then you'll deny it, cause that's what you do. you'll just accuse turf of beinf stupid, which is your favorite method of inflating your ego

you had no clue it was an index, you just assumed it was a fund. so you felt smart enough to ridicule my investment "choice" when in fact you don't know what you're talking about. pants down, step on dick.

so please, tell the board again why 60 days of underperformance relative to the s&p 500 INDEX matters. why stocks have been better. why your supposed investment expertice should be afforded any credibility WHEN YOU DON"T KNOW WHAT YOU"RE TALKING ABOUT

Actually, it's not. On the other hand, look at all your F bombs and ALL CAPS typing, and the irony of saying I needed to get a grip and full of rage during your little tantrum yesterday. Why's really wrong George? Something have you down?

Again, look in the mirror to see who is talking down to others to make themselves feel better, it's you. Maybe as much as you boast about handling wealthy people's money and sucking some fees like a remora, you do know that you are basically financial landscaper for people too lazy or don't care to do it themselves. You've tried to brag about your performance when you had it (supposedly at some point before we started arguing) and now underplaying performance when you don't, but maybe that's not enough for you. Maybe you want to act like you are the only one allowed to comment about the economy or markets here, because of your appeal to authority - and that need of yours is sad.

Actually, I just have found the easiest way to find out how emerging market bonds are doing is checking "iShares JP Morgan USD Emerging Market Bond ETF" which corresponds with EMBI and which title includes the word fund on google finance. Sorry I didn't know when talking about emerging market bonds you didn't have the ability to understand what general topic (emerging market bonds) even if included a word that describes the ETF I have found to make tracking quite easy that didn't apply to the index itself. If that's my biggest mistake talking about investing, I'm quite happy about it - better than shorting the S&P500 when it grew substantially, promising a recession in 2012 Q1, etc. etc.

Nonetheless, I repeat my point about you focusing on that rather than other subjects as being petty.

Well, if your job is to maintain wealth and only getting your clients 0.30% [updated] so far this year, and then will be less your fees, and less inflation along the way... you seem to not being doing so hot. At what point do you care? What are you telling them - trust you like last year, or ignore the news and read another permabear link you'll give them? You seemed to care about temporarily being right for a few weeks when S&P500 was down, yet reversed completely and now don't care about performance? On the other hand, 8.0% feels pretty nice and a good start.

And it's not just 2 months. 9.6% < 15.58% in 2012. But of course, you want to avoid talking about that so you redirect to this year.




Whatever you want to tell yourself in your mind, remember that it's clear to everyone who the angry person is and also for them to be able to see who did better last year and has been more aware of reality when it has come to the economy. You might be able to fool your clients - but remember... they needed a financial advisor for a reason, probably because they didn't have a clue and hence don't necessarily know you are full of it. But if what your said about them firing you if they don't like your performance is true, you might want to spend less time trying to show off or defend your ego here and actually start worrying about your clients performance.

[rwh11385]

To keep the thread updated about economic reality:

http://www.chicagotribune.com/business/sns-rt-us-usa-economy-factorybre9250tr-20130306,0,1854496.story

Private employers added 198,000 jobs to payrolls last month, the ADP National Employment Report showed, handily beating economists' expectations for an increase of 170,000. There were solid gains in construction, where payrolls rose by 21,000.

Adding to the report's firm tone, January's count was revised to show 23,000 more jobs added than previously reported.

The department also said non-defense capital goods orders excluding aircraft, a closely watched proxy for business spending plans, increased by a more robust 7.2 percent in January instead of 6.3 percent, as it reported last week.

That optimism was also captured in the Federal Reserve's Beige Book, which showed growth improving gradually in January and early February, largely thanks to a broad-based housing market recovery.

Should be interesting to see what Friday brings. I wouldn't be shocked if labor force grows a bit from people with renewed encouragement to find a job now re-joining.

[rwh11385]

As much as George may say he predicted I'd post an update about the jobs report, who wouldn't when talking about the economy that is supposedly just plain awful in George's eyes?

I guess the drop in first time jobless claims and ADP report did signal an improved job market.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/business/us-job-growth-likely-continued-in-feb-fueled-by-consumer-spending-and-economic-gains/2013/03/08/c9f0078e-87c6-11e2-a80b-3edc779b676f_story.html

Stronger hiring adds 236,000 jobs and reduces unemployment to 7.7 pct., a 4-year low

Employers added 236,000 jobs in February and drove down the unemployment rate to 7.7 percent, its lowest level in more than four years. The gains signal that companies are confident enough in the economy to intensify hiring even in the face of tax increases and government spending cuts.

[...]

The hiring has been fueled by steady improvement in housing, auto sales, manufacturing and corporate profits, along with record-low borrowing rates.

George, do you perceive any chance of the Grand Rotation affecting your bond investments? Or assume there's no chance and call me ignorant to consider it because you are too arrogant to?

http://www.cnbc.com/id/100538789

Cracks Starting to Show in Bond Funds

And lots of talk about possible slowing of deleveraging and people starting to borrow again: http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/...0BP02S20130307
U.S. household debt rose in Q4, sign de-leverage cycle bottomed

U.S. household debt grew at its fastest pace since early 2008 in the fourth quarter last year, a possible sign that the painful process of paring back borrowing in the aftermath of the financial crisis may have run its course.

Hopefully we won't get back to our old ways, but more moderate in the middle between tight wads and spending more than we make.

Do you consider it possible for the Wealth Effect to help consumption? Or just economics mumbo jumbo and ignore it?

http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/6a6b2b42-8729-11e2-9dd7-00144feabdc0.html#axzz2MzT0iM00

US household wealth highest since 2007

US households increased their debt levels to the highest in five years in the December quarter at the same time as the net worth of families rose to its highest level since the recession thanks to rising home prices and financial assets.

[...]

Compared with the same period in 2011, households’ net worth was up 9 per cent.

And what did you say about Treasury yields?

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-03-08/treasuries-drop-as-payrolls-increase-unemployment-rate-falls.html

Treasury Yields Rise to 11-Month High as Job Gains Top Forecasts

Yields on 10-year notes had the biggest weekly increase in almost a year as gauges of company hiring and U.S. services industries rose more than forecast.

Obviously there are headwinds from the sequester cuts and will be government direct and contractor job losses, but hopefully that won't upset the recovery. It's like Congress (especially the GOP) is trying to do their best effort to trash the economy. However, if they get their shit together and work on the budget and debt ceiling without waiting until the last minute, the country might be on a better path. The GOP should focus on mandatory spending which the sequester ignored entirely as well as reform for medical malpractice lawsuits.

Oh well, who expects George to write it all off and ignore it, while posting some permabear's negative comments and a prediction for doom and gloom?

[robrez]

^I'd like to think he's busy taking a long hard look at himself in the mirror.... But we all know he's simply retrenching.