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US Gross Domestic Product, Second Quarter 2022 (Advance Estimate)

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Re: US Gross Domestic Product, Second Quarter 2022 (Advance Estimate)

#341

Post by somenameforme »

hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #285
djfobbz wrote: post #274

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why does everything you personally don't agree with have to be a "conspiracy theory"? Seems like a trend these days!

The comment I am replying to is pretty clearly arguing that not calling the current situation a recession is due to the current administration not wanting to call it that: > Now suddenly it's questionable, because the current administration would like to shrug away its failures, and too many in the media are helping them do it. Whether or not I agree with the assessment of the current administration wanting to "shrug…

Imagine for a moment that a recession was something quite rare, but extremely desirable and good. But outside of that difference, all of the current state of the word's definition would remain. Do you honestly believe the current administration wouldn't be parading out that we're in a recession, along with all of the usual media making front page news of it?

So we use the usual rule of thumb to claim it's a recession when it's a good thing, but instead try claim it's not a recession until a given think-tank says so when it's a bad thing.

Re: US Gross Domestic Product, Second Quarter 2022 (Advance Estimate)

#342

Post by paisawalla »

corrral wrote: post #299
adgjlsfhk1 wrote: post #231

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Price controls on medicine in Europe have worked very well compared to America's "free market" by pretty much any measure.

Not just Europe—price controls (de jure or de facto, the latter via e.g. establishing a monopsony) are, as best I can tell, the main unifying factor in healthcare systems in the entire OECD except the US. Those systems differ a lot, but at some point and on some level, they all fall back on price controls, apparently to good effect.

Just looking through the OECD's datasets [0], I see a lot of health care quality and utilization measures missing for the US and many other OECD countries. How are you defining "good effect"?

[0] https://stats.oecd.org/Index.aspx?QueryId=49344#

I was able to find some incomplete data that suggests the US is pretty good on the metric of wait time, compared to many European countries and Canada:

https://www.oecd-ilibrary.org/sites/242e3c8c-en/1/3/2/index....

Re: US Gross Domestic Product, Second Quarter 2022 (Advance Estimate)

#343

Post by mym1990 »

tfehring wrote: post #321
camhart wrote: post #297

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Consumer balance sheets are strong. Consumer debt is at record highs for overall debt, and household credit card debt is climbing towards record levels. https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.cnbc.com/amp/2022/05/10/hou... https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.cnbc.com/amp/2022/05/10/con...

The fastest-growing (and largest) category of that debt was mortgage debt, which is probably a positive economic indicator if anything, though note that that's based on Q1 data. Household debt servicing costs as a percent of disposable income are still lower than at any point between 1980 (the earliest data available) and the start of the pandemic. https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/TDSP Also keep in mind that those…

Is this a positive effect? I think it is for lower inflation rates, but above a certain threshold the borrowing can get out of hand, people will go and get more loans, which will drive prices higher. Eventually the bubble pops and people go underwater.

Re: US Gross Domestic Product, Second Quarter 2022 (Advance Estimate)

#344

Post by s1artibartfast »

I fundamentally don't understand the argument that we're not in a economic recession because employment is high.

This is like saying sure you can't buy as much bread, but at least you are working longer.

The fact that more people are working to produce less describes an economy in decline.

What am I missing here?

Re: US Gross Domestic Product, Second Quarter 2022 (Advance Estimate)

#345

Post by NovemberWhiskey »

_marlowe_ wrote: post #250
yuan43 wrote: post #43

> Real gross domestic product (GDP) decreased at an annual rate of 0.9 percent in the second quarter of 2022 (table 1), according to the "advance" estimate released by the Bureau of Economic Analysis. In the first quarter, real GDP decreased 1.6 percent. That makes two back-to-back quarters of real GDP contraction. To some, this is a recession, but it's the NBER that puts the stamp on it. AFAIK, NBER has never failed…

2-10 spread went through the pre-GFC record of -28 bps a day or two ago.

I'm a little sanguine about the inverted yield curve as a real signal this time around, to be honest.

We're in an environment of very rapidly rising short-term interest rates, specifically as the Fed attempts to try to manage inflation; with back-to-back 75 bps increases. That tends to have a curve flattening effect as the yield curve is nominal; short term yields rise more than longer tenors if the market believes that inflation will decrease as real yields will be higher.

Re: US Gross Domestic Product, Second Quarter 2022 (Advance Estimate)

#346

Post by hedora »

tootie wrote: post #135
melling wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Doesn’t a Fed typically lower rates during a recession? At least at some point, in order to bring a country out of the recession.

The Fed lowers rates when lowering rates could plausibly help. The Fed has a dual mandate to control inflation and maximize employment. Employment remains incredibly strong while inflation is obviously too high which is the clearest possible signal to tighten. The Fed won't/can't react to changes in the stock market, supply chain or foreign policy. It's not just "loosen during recession, tighten during expansion".

Also, as the Biden administration is quick to point out, US industrial output is up.

So, people are accepting fewer, apparently better employment offers, manufacturing is being onshored, but (due to lower supply of foreign slave labor and exploitable US workers) profits are down, and inflation is up.

Since unemplyoment is low, the Fed mandate seems pretty clear at this point. Interest rates should go up. The market will tank for a few years because inflation and paying workers screws with profits, then bounce back (in real terms) once corporate debt, etc unwinds, and productivity starts to rise again.

Rigid and weak corporations will be displaced by startups and existing companies that are able to adapt/innovate.

It's weird to me that Fox News's staunchly anti-China, pro-US manufacturing Fox News's viewership is so bent out of shape.

Aren't we experiencing exactly the effect Trump's tariffs were supposed to achieve?

Re: US Gross Domestic Product, Second Quarter 2022 (Advance Estimate)

#347

Post by rayiner »

partiallypro wrote: post #237

I personally think we're in recession and the reason is datapoints outside of this GDP print, what companies are saying, and the fact I know people that have been laid off already. What I find pathetic is that saying we are in a recession is now a political stance. I think we all know that if a Republican were President the entire narrative would shift, with most of the press saying we're in recession while Fox, etc…

> How did we get to a point where actual data can be outright denied or absorbed based on your political viewpoint?

Our elites—I don’t mean that pejoratively, but descriptively—used to adhere to institutional values. When I joined a prominent NYC law firm 10 years ago nobody commented on the fact that it was named after someone who argued the pro-segregation other side of Brown v. Board. The institution, not only of the firm but the legal process itself-where even segregationists are entitled to their day in court—was a credo that transcended individual politics or individual notions of “justice” or “human rights.”

That flipped sometime in the last decade. Our institutions have been overtaken my millenarianism: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Millenarianism. It’s a belief system that transcends institutional values—in the law, the media, everywhere.

Do you remember “The Resistance?” Where Clinton-supporting government employees pledged to work within the bureaucracy to defeat the agenda of the duly elected President—their boss? The craziness we’ve been seeing from conservatives lately is a reaction to that total abandonment of institutional values.

Re: US Gross Domestic Product, Second Quarter 2022 (Advance Estimate)

#348

Post by kube-system »

OscarCunningham wrote: post #332
NovemberWhiskey wrote: post #161

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Fed has no mandate to generate or maintain economic growth. The two areas in which it does have a mandate are price stability and sustainable employment. Usually, recessions are accompanied by a loss of jobs, so that's where the Fed would intervene; that isn't happening thus far which is another reason why economists are split over what is really going on in the economy.

> The Fed has no mandate to generate or maintain economic growth. Correct. And yet they let inflation get this bad, so it seems like they're trying to avoid recessions even though they haven't been told to.

Or they believed it would be transitory and any action would upset longer term price and employment stability.

Re: US Gross Domestic Product, Second Quarter 2022 (Advance Estimate)

#349

Post by jmalicki »

junofan wrote: post #121
jhoward321 wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They didn't redefine recession, that's been defined by NBER. I agree there's some spin, but this statement isn't correct.

The NBER is a private think tank. You may be confusing them with the Bureau of Economic Analysis, which is an independent federal agency.

No, it is the NBER. Even the BEA says the NBER officially defines recessions:

https://www.bea.gov/help/glossary/recession

Re: US Gross Domestic Product, Second Quarter 2022 (Advance Estimate)

#350

Post by partiallypro »

mym1990 wrote: post #325
partiallypro wrote: post #237

I personally think we're in recession and the reason is datapoints outside of this GDP print, what companies are saying, and the fact I know people that have been laid off already. What I find pathetic is that saying we are in a recession is now a political stance. I think we all know that if a Republican were President the entire narrative would shift, with most of the press saying we're in recession while Fox, etc…

Hasn't the economy always been part of a political stance? The economy is one of the top 2/3 factors that people consider when voting, hence being important for re-election. It would be in the best interest of anyone trying to run for election to strategically paint a good/bad picture of the economy. This has been the case probably going back to the 1930s if I were to guess.

It certainly impacts people's votes, but when I go to a news site I don't think in the 70s, 80s, etc you'd find people trying so very hard to say a contracting economy is just a "transition" and not a recession. My point is mostly on what the press is doing in their reporting and trying to protect the current party in power ahead of the mid-terms. I know it would be the opposite if things were reversed, with Fox denying the economic reality. I just find it pretty pathetic. What would be the harm in reporting we are in a mild recession other than it runs counter to the White House?

The press is one of the most loathed things in the country and they always seem to dig their grave even deeper.

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