U.S. Economy Shrinks at 4.8% Pace, Signaling Start of Recession • Hacker News Board

Re: U.S. Economy Shrinks at 4.8% Pace, Signaling Start of Recession

#321

Post by [deleted] » Wed, Apr 29, 2020, 3:38 PM UTC

ceejayoz wrote: post #265

maram wrote: post #199

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Missing 5/8ths of a school year is going to be absolutely devastating for this generation of kids. Which subject can they study at school that they cannot study at home?

Some of them have essential workers as parents and are left unsupervised during the day. Some have parents ill equipped to assist them with school work those parents never completed themselves. (Hell, I went to college, and my kids' math work is a challenge.) Some have no access to internet. I saw an article the other day (I'm unfortunately having trouble Googling it up) that said some school districts have 15-20% st…

[deleted]

Re: U.S. Economy Shrinks at 4.8% Pace, Signaling Start of Recession

#322

Post by hunter2_ » Wed, Apr 29, 2020, 3:38 PM UTC

Tistron wrote: post #157

cpursley wrote: post #121

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

In Scandinavia we've had some sort of pragmatic market socialism, not much central planning but reasonable redistribution in various ways. Seems to work fairly well, although large parts of it has been (and is being) dismantled by the liberals (those are the right here, not the left).

Wait, are you saying that the terms "right/left" are used opposite compared to the US (meaning that the Scandinavian right prefers socialism), or that the term "liberal" is used opposite compared to the US (meaning that Scandinavian liberals oppose socialism)?

Re: U.S. Economy Shrinks at 4.8% Pace, Signaling Start of Recession

#323

Post by slfnflctd » Wed, Apr 29, 2020, 3:38 PM UTC

eppp wrote: post #268

OldHand2018 wrote: post #248

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Lenders and banks were supposed to start going easy on loans but ive had two emails and a phone call about the loan for my Silverado this month and wouldnt you know, the caller was excited to mention my stimulus check. Don't settle for this. My niece had her car repossessed 3 weeks ago. They said for $18k cash she could have it. We told them to pound sand. She's borrowing cars and getting rides, but next week she'l…

The used car market has been inflated for years. 100k+ mile vehicles selling for over half their new price makes no sense to me.

It makes sense if the car tends to last 350k+ miles and has only been gently used. There are at least a few models that have pretty consistently been getting up to that or higher before major repair is needed since 2010 or so. I will say I think quality hybrids (again, gently used) are worth more than a lot of their counterparts on this point.

Re: U.S. Economy Shrinks at 4.8% Pace, Signaling Start of Recession

#324

Post by icelancer » Wed, Apr 29, 2020, 3:38 PM UTC

usaar333 wrote: post #276

ISL wrote: post #262

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A fair point. It is paradoxical that a sputtering economy can make equities worth more cheeseburgers, rather than fewer, but I see the logic. At some point, given the choice between a low-yielding equity and a cheeseburger, I'd rather have the cheeseburger.

Exactly. The thing people may also forget who have a long time horizon is that this is actually a bad thing. Returns are likely historically low going forward which is bad for your future retirement.

>> Returns are likely historically low going forward which is bad for your future retirement.

For sure. People are not factoring in the long-term interest rate here - they should look at the risk-free T-bill rates in the 1980s and how equities performed against them, and what we're looking at as well.

Re: U.S. Economy Shrinks at 4.8% Pace, Signaling Start of Recession

#325

Post by qppo » Wed, Apr 29, 2020, 3:39 PM UTC

Server6 wrote: post #309

eppp wrote: post #268

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The used car market has been inflated for years. 100k+ mile vehicles selling for over half their new price makes no sense to me.

It's because of the long term 72-84 month loans. People are trading in used cars for close to the loan payoff amounts - which is still pretty high.

GM had 0% interest for 84 month loans on their trucks for awhile there.

something is very wrong with the lending market when it makes sense to give people free money.

Re: U.S. Economy Shrinks at 4.8% Pace, Signaling Start of Recession

#326

Post by ramblerman » Wed, Apr 29, 2020, 3:39 PM UTC

ceejayoz wrote: post #274

londons_explore wrote: post #6

Thats 4.8% annualized. The real figure is 1.17% for 3 months. It's quite impressively small really, considering everyone is sitting at home, and many aren't working at all.

That's a weird way of doing the numbers. If I get murdered in December, it's not super helpful to note that I was 92% alive on average that year.

Sometimes analogies are clever in that they simplify a concept, I'm not sure you got there.

you are either dead or alive. Economic growth is a percentage.

Re: U.S. Economy Shrinks at 4.8% Pace, Signaling Start of Recession

#327

Post by derg » Wed, Apr 29, 2020, 3:39 PM UTC

balls187 wrote: post #289

abduhl wrote: post #214

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why do they have to make exceptions? Absent a government mandate there is no requirement and, unfortunately, the mortgage is secured by the underlying property. I fully expect, and you should too, foreclosures to skyrocket and people to be on the street. The banking sector is not in the business of shares sacrifice and the US government isn’t in the business of letting the banks collapse. This lockdown will kill peop…

> I fully expect, and you should too, foreclosures to skyrocket and people to be on the street. Why, in the worlds wealthiest nation is that something I should expect?

Because those who write the rules are going to use the massive number of foreclosures to buy up property dirt cheap like they did in '08 and beyond.

It's a feature, not a bug. We're seeing one of the largest transfers of wealth from the poor to the wealthy ever and it's only getting worse. The cruelty is the point.

Oh also don't forget the number of people who are, or will shortly be, underwater with their car payments too. That's another ticking time bomb.

Re: U.S. Economy Shrinks at 4.8% Pace, Signaling Start of Recession

#328

Post by icelancer » Wed, Apr 29, 2020, 3:40 PM UTC

drcode wrote: post #254

ISL wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is a bet on the continued support of the market by the Fed. If you're interested in preserving purchasing power 15 years from now, would you rather hold dollars or things today? As a value investor, all of my theses were blown out of the water by the unprecedented Fed intervention. It is an environment in which the fundamentals are uncertain. I'm standing pat and waiting for things to make sense before moving agai…

I felt like the biggest dolt that I didn't sell my stocks en masse a couple of weeks before the plunge, when it was already obvious C19 was going to be a big deal. I reasoned "The Fed will just inflate the currency to maintain stock prices anyway, so why would I want to go long on the dollar?" Now a month later, my initial instincts don't seem so wrong anymore: My portfolio is doing fine... All I missed out on was a…

There was also biflation in the market, as many people have somewhat alluded to - tech stocks and specific sectors have exploded while others have collapsed. There has been a significant redistribution of alpha even if the total losses came in under what they expected.

Re: U.S. Economy Shrinks at 4.8% Pace, Signaling Start of Recession

#329

Post by [deleted] » Wed, Apr 29, 2020, 3:40 PM UTC

ahi wrote: post #301

ceejayoz wrote: post #265

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Some of them have essential workers as parents and are left unsupervised during the day. Some have parents ill equipped to assist them with school work those parents never completed themselves. (Hell, I went to college, and my kids' math work is a challenge.) Some have no access to internet. I saw an article the other day (I'm unfortunately having trouble Googling it up) that said some school districts have 15-20% st…

My son's school started remote classes this week. More than a third are missing in action. Naturally it is the third that benefited the most from the structure and support of school.

[deleted]

Re: U.S. Economy Shrinks at 4.8% Pace, Signaling Start of Recession

#330

Post by JibJabDab » Wed, Apr 29, 2020, 3:40 PM UTC

Filligree wrote: post #149

res0nat0r wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I understand their thinking because not working is causing a massive amount of collateral damage, but the virus doesn't care about any of that. If everyone goes back to normal too early, this all just starts over, and folks are forced to be inside even longer, there's just no way around it.

80-90% of people who catch this disease would survive without treatment. If America won't support people who might die of starvation when stuck at home, then the individually smartest response becomes to take their chance with the virus. I don't need to explain what a 10-20% death rate would do to society, however.

There's also some very concerning long-term effects for those who have recovered. There's a trend of seeing lung-scarring or other things that I'm sure will come up again int 10 or 15 years. Imagine that happening to a large portion of society.