Bloomberg.com – Shutdown Would Shave Fourth-Quarter U.S. Growth as Much as 1.4% A shutdown of the U.S. government would reduce fourth-quarter economic growth by as much as 1.4 percentage points depending on its length, economists say, as government workers from park rangers to telephone receptionists are furloughed. Mark Zandi of Moody’s Analytics Inc. estimates a… Continue reading When To Pay Attention To The Shutdown
The Economist – Free exchange: The missing millions Rising disability claims may explain America’s shrinking labour force Many economists believe much of this decline in participation is structural. They argue it reflects increased college enrolment by the young, the approach of retirement for the baby-boomers and a levelling-off in women’s participation after rapid post-war increases.… Continue reading Disability And Jobs
[pageview class=”PDFViewer” url=”https://www.biancoresearch.com/bianco/wp-content/plugins/PDFViewer/plugin.php?id=150″] CNBC.com – What’s in a name? Lots when it comes to Obamacare/ACA What’s in a name? When it comes to the debate over health care, apparently a lot. In CNBC’s third-quarter All-America Economic Survey, we asked half of the 812 poll respondents if they support Obamacare and the other half if they… Continue reading What’s In A Name?
Bloomberg.com – Simon Johnson: Three Unlearned Lessons From the Financial Crisis There are three straightforward and rather obvious lessons from the collapse of Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. five years ago: The financial crisis was devastating; we haven’t ended the problems associated with “too big to fail” financial institutions; and we must force the biggest banks… Continue reading Forgetting The Lesson Of The Financial Crisis
Comment Who would have thought a blue barrel had so many uses?! The Wall Street Journal – How ‘Breaking Bad’ Finale Can Stick the Landing With the approach of Sunday’s finale of the Emmy-winning drama “Breaking Bad,” fans have gathered online and in office huddles to speculate about how the show will tie up its… Continue reading More On Heisenberg And Business
None Today
The Daily Beast – Companies Must Get Smarter About Hiring and Nurturing Part-Time Workers A large portion of the U.S. workforce is now permanently working part-time. The expectation that an improving economy would ease millions of unhappy part-time workers back into full time jobs hasn’t come to fruition. And with the agonizing slow rise in… Continue reading Part-Time vs. Full-Time Jobs In The U.S.
<Click on chart for larger image> Bloomberg.com – Wal-Mart Cutting Orders as Unsold Merchandise Piles Up Wal-Mart Stores Inc. (WMT) is cutting orders it places with suppliers this quarter and next to address rising inventory the company flagged in last month’s earnings report. Last week, an ordering manager at the company’s Bentonville, Arkansas, headquarters described… Continue reading Walmart
<Click on chart for larger image> The New York Times – Treasury Puts a Date on When Cash May Run Out: Oct. 17 The Treasury will only have $30 billion of cash on hand by mid-October, putting the United States on the precipice of an unprecedented default, the department said on Wednesday. The warning puts… Continue reading The U.S. Will Be Broke On October 17
Project Syndicate – Stephen S. Roach: Occupy QE The Federal Reserve continues to cling to a destabilizing and ineffective strategy. By maintaining its policy of quantitative easing (QE) – which entails monthly purchases of long-term assets worth $85 billion – the Fed is courting an increasingly treacherous endgame at home and abroad. By now, the… Continue reading Occupy QE
The Financial Times – Robert Shrimsley: Forward guidance and home economics Central bankers must tread lightly to manage the weight of their wives’ expectations Questions are being asked in the markets about the central bank creed of forward guidance (the practice of giving a clear steer on the direction of future policy and circumstances in… Continue reading Forward Guidance
The Wall Street Journal – For a Yellen Fed, Smooth Transition Will Be Tall Order Among the Challenges: Managing the Easy-Money Exit and Presenting a Unified Voice The handoff at the Federal Reserve from Ben Bernanke to Janet Yellen, the president’s presumptive pick for the post, will be the trickiest since Paul Volcker took over… Continue reading Transitioning To A New FOMC Leader