My take is that you look for a recession in the facts, not in your personal anecdotes. Same with global warming and any other important thing that affects (or will affect), but is outside of and bigger than your own personal world. Three years from now, you may make a post with similar observations concluding that "the recovery they talk about isn't happening that I can see". That will say nothing about whether or not a recovery is happening.
Recession? I didn't see it this weekend. What's your take?
by restrangled 33 Replies latest jw friends
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no more kool aid
I was out today too and the stores and restaurants were packed. I needed a pair of curtains and it was busy no one could even help me. I got a haircut and the girls there said business was really down. I think a lot of the people out there that are consumers now have never really hit hard economic times, myself included. As long as people have a couple of extra bucks, maybe from lower gas prices right now, they are out there spending it instead of considering saving it. In my family we have reined it in a little bit for instance I would not even consider a vacation right now a piece of jewelry or buying a bigger house, I would just rather save that money. But still went out to breakfast today, to the grocery store, haircuts, that's a fun day for me.
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IP_SEC
My take is that you look for a recession in the facts, not in your personal anecdotes.
Personal anecdotes can just as factual as any other fact. A person's life is just a microcosm of the big picture. Im sorry there are people here still doing well inspite of this recession thing sixy. Im also sorry The Day After Tomorrow didnt happen quite like we planned yet.
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purplesofa
Commissioner's Statement on the Employment Situation News Release
Advance copies of this statement are made available to the press under lock-up conditions with the explicit understanding that the data are embargoed until 8:30 a.m. Eastern Standard Time. Statement of Keith Hall Commissioner Bureau of Labor Statistics Friday, November 7, 2008 Nonfarm payroll employment fell by 240,000 in October, and the unemployment rate rose from 6.1 to 6.5 percent. Job losses over the last 3 months totaled 651,000, after accounting for downward revisions to employment estimates for August and September. So far this year, payroll employment has decreased by 1.2 million. In October, manufacturing employment continued to fall (-90,000), with declines occurring throughout the sector. A large drop in transportation equipment employment (-40,000) reflected continued weakness in motor vehicles and parts as well as a strike involving 27,000 workers in the aerospace industry. Other sizable job losses occurred in fabricated metal products (-11,000), furniture (-10,000), wood products (-7,000), and plastics and rubber products (-6,000). Manufacturing hours and overtime were unchanged at 40.6 and 3.6 hours, respectively. Construction employment declined by 49,000 over the month. Since its peak in September 2006, employment in this industry has fallen by 663,000. Most of the declines over this period occurred in residential specialty trades (-349,000) and in residential building (-199,000). Retail trade employment fell by 38,000 in October, with the largest losses occurring among automobile dealers (-20,000) and department stores (-18,000). Wholesale trade employment fell by 22,000 over the month, with most of the loss occurring in durable goods distribution. Employment in financial activities declined by 24,000 in October; credit intermediation, which includes banking, accounted for about half of the loss. The securities industry shed 6,000 jobs in October, following a loss of 9,000 in September. The employment services industry, which includes temporary help agencies, continued to contract in October (-51,000) and has lost about half a million jobs since the most recent peak in August 2006. Health care employment rose by 26,000 in October and by 348,000 over the past 12 months. Mining added 7,000 jobs over the month. Since a low in April 2003, mining employment has increased by 246,000 (nearly 50 percent). Average hourly earnings for production and nonsupervisory workers in the private sector increased by 4 cents, or 0.2 percent, in October. Over the past 12 months, average hourly earnings have increased by 3.5 percent. From September 2007 to September 2008, the Consumer Price Index for Urban Wage Earners and Clerical Workers (CPI-W) rose by 5.4 percent. Turning to labor market measures from the survey of households, the unemployment rate rose by 0.4 percentage point to 6.5 percent in October. The rate was 4.8 percent a year earlier. About 10.1 million persons were unemployed in October, an increase of 603,000 over the month and 2.8 million over the past 12 months. About 2.3 million individuals had been unemployed for 27 weeks or more, an increase of 249,000 over the month and 942,000 over the past 12 months. Both the labor force participation rate, at 66.1 percent, and the employment-population ratio, at 61.8 percent, were little changed over the month. The employment-population ratio has declined by 0.9 percentage point over the year and by 1.6 percentage points from its recent peak in December 2006. The number of persons working part time who would have preferred full-time employment increased by 645,000 in October to 6.7 million. Over the last 12 months, the number of such workers has grown by 2.3 million. In summary, nonfarm payroll employment declined by 240,000 in October, and the unemployment rate rose to 6.5 percent.
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purplesofa
http://www.newsweek.com/id/164211
During his 1980 Labor Day speech at New Jersey's Liberty State Park, Republican presidential nominee Ronald Reagan listed the economic failures of his opponent, President Jimmy Carter. With the Statue of Liberty as a backdrop, Reagan used the moment to respond to Carter, who had accused Reagan of misusing the term "depression" to describe a recession that began in January of that year. "Let it show on the record that when the American people cried out for economic help, Jimmy Carter took refuge behind a dictionary. Well, if it's a definition he wants, I'll give him one. A recession is when your neighbor loses his job. A depression is when you lose yours. And recovery is when Jimmy Carter loses his."
However imprecise Reagan's macroeconomic definitions may have been, he'd made his point. Semantics don't mean much to Americans who have lost or are about to lose their jobs, their savings and their homes. But for those charged with charting the fastest course to an economic recovery, knowing the exact severity of the situation is critical. So what does constitute a recession, or a depression? Answering that question is harder—and takes longer—than you might expect.
Some economists define a recession as two consecutive quarters of economic contraction, or a decline in real gross domestic product (GDP). By that measure, the U.S. wasn't off to a bad start this year. According to the Bureau of Economic Analysis, real U.S. GDP rose 0.9 percent in the first quarter of 2008 and 2.8 percent in the second quarter. The problem with such a simple definition, according to James Poterba, president of the National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER), the official arbiter of when recessions begin and end, is that it "omits the possibility that you see two very tiny declines in two quarters, and [it also] doesn't look at other information for the rest of the economy, which may suggest that what is happening is not a broad decline."
According to NBER's definition, a recession occurs when a "significant decline in economic activity is spread across the economy, lasting more than a few months, normally visible in real GDP, real income, employment, industrial production, and wholesale-retail sales." The beginning of a recession is commonly referred to as a business-cycle "peak," and the end of it is called a business-cycle "trough."
Robert Gordon, a member of the NBER committee responsible for determining the beginning and end dates of recessions, says making a determination is often complicated by the fact that figures like GDP can be revised substantially even years later. Roy Smith, a professor at NYU's Stern School of Business, adds, "It's very frustrating for commentators and other folks who feel like they know in their gut that we are in a recession, but that is not a very scientific [approach,] so people can get it wrong. The choice is that someone calls it based on their gut, or we wait for the data."
Waiting for the data tends to take some time. As a result, most recessions have not been declared by NBER until at least five months after they've ended. The one marker that seems to be a constant in most recessions is unemployment. "There has never, in the postwar U.S., been a 1 percentage point increase in unemployment without a recession having been declared, and much of that increase in unemployment occurs after the recession started," says Gordon. "Right now, we've had a 1.7 percent increase in unemployment. On historical precedence, absolutely this is a recession. All we have to do is figure out when it began."
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sammielee24
Depends where you live. I've seen drastic changes over the past 6 months in the mall traffic - there have been times when there are 5 people walking in the mall. No lines at all in any of the Walmart nor the Target - Kmart was empty. Pennys which is usually a mess had no line ups but some great sales. Nobody is buying around here, but then there are counties where the unemployment rate is over 12% and rising fast.
As for the full shopping carts , there are people that cashed but did not spend their stimulus checks, holding off for Christmas, so I wonder how many people are in that crowd. Then you have the people who are so far in the hole that their reasoning is why stop now? Spend on credit until they declare bankruptcy - might as well go down big.
I see most of the people spending on food in some of the cheaper stores - a lot of full carts. I do see some people shopping for the kids and they seem to be buying Christmas stuff, mostly small things and that's in Walmart or Target. You could shoot a canon through Toys R Us and I'd be surprised to see them stay afloat in the next year.
The places I see the most traffic are in the restaurants - but only the middle of the road and fast food places, Walmart and the food stores.
No, I don't the the recession is overplayed, I think it depends on how much it affects the people in it for a lot of reasons. The way people react and their attitude to it is what will bring them through. sammieswife.
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restrangled
Here is how I see it....average Americans are spending as usual but they have become very smart....., they watch for coupons, sales, save for a while then spend as they see fit. They are hanging on to their cars, longer and finding different ways to entertain themsleves. It's easier to rent movies, than go to the theater, its fun to learn great recipes on television and do it your self than spend money on eating out.
There are now on line classes available instead of applying to a University, you can excersise at home vs. a gym membership.
I manage to squeek one tank of gas out of my car for 2 months. The last time I paid it was over 4 per gallon......I better go fill up again now that its under 2.
In other words, maybe consumers are just getting smarter and smarter and Wall street is howling to the moon, the main businesses cutting jobs, and of course profits and then begging Congress.......(we need money to pay our executives...please send us Millions) We have laid off millions of workers or are going to, so you must support our business.
r.
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jaguarbass
Here in Florida, I have a lot of friends that are out of work.
In Pinellas county there are many empty businesses, bars and restaurants closed down.
But the mall was busy friday.
We have a lot of retirees on social security and pensions who get their money no matter what.
I work in a jail. We have 7 openings because we go through 4 officers a month come hell or high water, If they dont quit they get fired.
We have over 300 applicants for the 7 openings.
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sammielee24
Good point jaguar...there is a casino opening up somewhere down south and they opened up about 1300 jobs - they got 14,500 applications.
I just watched some PBS show on how all this got started and they interviewed top guns inside the rating companies on Wall Street. They all need to be arrested. According to these insiders, it was greed. S&P, Fitch etc were grading the bad risk at triple A and then selling those out as such - people thinking they were buying triple A rated investments were buying junk. It starts with the rating agencies who knew and didn't care about the risky loans.
sammieswife.
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JeffT
We were out shopping today and every where we were was packed. But about a month ago I was in a different mall about two miles away and you could have fired a cannon without hurting anybody. All of the stores have "now hiring" signs out. But those will be for temp jobs during the holidays.
I don't trust the media.
