Group items tagged

Economist: U.S. labor market recovery is a fraud http://www.bizjournals.com/jacksonville/news/2013/10/02/economist-us-labor-market-recovery.html University of Central Florida economist Sean Snaith has this to say about the current labor market recovery: It's a fraud. That's because there's more to assessing economic recovery than just monthly payroll job gains and a declining unemployment rate, he said. "You need to look at the number of jobs being created in the context of the potential number of workers in the U.S. economy," Snaith said. "The gap between payroll employment and the Congressional Budget Office estimates of the potential number of workers in the U.S. economy is pretty darn scary right now." If payroll job growth were to persist at the average level of the past three jobs reports and increase at just 148,000 jobs per month, it would take until December 2021 for employment to reach its CBO estimated potential, he added. In his 2013 third-quarter U.S. forecast, Snaith explains that by just focusing on the unemployment rate, many analysts erroneously are predicting a fast recovery that's simply not there yet. That's why it's not surprising that consumers are holding back on spending, which in the past has brought the economy out of the doldrums, he said. Snaith was only one of four national economists to predict that the federal Reserve Bank would continue to funnel billions of dollars into the market on a daily basis as a way to help stimulate the economy and not begin tapering that process until 2014. "Will the Federal Reserve's exit be more like Ginger Rogers gliding across the dance floor or Miley Cyrus awkwardly twerking remains to be seen," Snaith said. "But given the phony labor-market recovery it could be some time before the Fed hits the dance floor." More Related Article: http://www.wattpad.com/25728832-the-corliss-group-stocks-surge-past-economic http://www.yellowbook.com/profile/corliss-group-the_1855

By Maria Gallucci - Global economic growth is expected to dip this year, following the fiercely cold winter that plagued the United States and turbulence in Ukraine and the world's financial markets. The World Bank on Tuesday said it reduced its global growth forecast to 2.8 percent this year, down from a January projection of 3.2 percent, Bloomberg News reported. The U.S. forecast was cut to 2.1 percent from 2.8 percent, and outlooks for Brazil, Russia, India and China also fell -- a sign that emerging economies aren't moving fast enough or investing sufficiently in domestic structural reforms, which are needed to accelerate economic expansion, according to the Washington-based institution. It recommended smaller budget deficits, higher interest rates and productivity-boosting measures to stave off future financial unrest, Bloomberg said. The growth setbacks, however, might be short-lived. The 2015 projection for global economic growth held steady at 3.4 percent, Bloomberg noted, and growth is expected to regain speed this year despite earlier weaknesses, the World Bank said in its Global Economic Prospects report. "The financial health of economies has improved. ... But we are not totally out of the woods yet," Kaushik Basu, the lender's chief economist, said. "A gradual tightening of fiscal policy and structural reforms are desirable to restore fiscal space depleted by the 2008 financial crisis. In brief, now is the time to prepare for the next crisis."

The World Bank's most recent Global Economic Prospects (GEP) report, released this week, says a global economic recovery is underway, underpinned by strengthening output and demand in high-income countries. Global GDP growth in 2014 will be 2.8 percent and it is expected to rise to about 4.2 percent by 2016, according to the report, which the World Bank publishes twice a year. Average GDP growth in developing countries has reached 4.8 percent in 2014, faster than in high-income countries but slower than in the boom period before the global financial and economic crisis of 2008. Demand side stimulus or supply side reforms? The global economic slowdown that struck in 2008 was caused by a financial crisis that resulted in large part from the bursting of an enormous, fraud-ridden mortgage lending bubble in the US. The crisis led to varying responses in different countries. The GEP report's authors said that in general, developing countries privileged demand stimulus policies over structural reforms during the past several years. For example, in 2008 to 2009, China implemented a four trillion-renminbi ($586 billion) stimulus program as a direct response to the slowdown in global trade caused by the global financial crisis. Critics pointed to over-investment in China as a risk to continued fast growth. The country is now struggling to contain a real estate bubble of its own. The World Bank wants China and other emerging countries to refocus on structural reforms. "A gradual tightening of fiscal policy and structural reforms are desirable to restore fiscal space depleted by the 2008 financial crisis," the bank's chief economist, Kaushik Basu, has said. "In brief, now is the time to prepare for the next crisis."