My latest column at the Christian Science Monitor: America’s fiscal challenges are often portrayed as a conflict between hawks and doves. The real battle, however, is between foxes and hedgehogs. “The fox knows many things, but the hedgehog knows one big thing,” wrote the ancient Greek poet Archilochus. Both foxes and hedgehogs play important roles [...]
Archive for August, 2011
A Synchronized Slowdown in Developed Economies
Posted in Economy, International, Macroeconomics, tagged GDP, International, Macroeconomics on August 17, 2011 | 1 Comment »
Which of the following nations recorded the strongest economic growth in the second quarter? France, Germany, Italy, Japan, or the United States? This nice chart from today’s Wall Street Journal provides the answer (click for larger version): The U.S. expanded at a tepid 1.3% annual pace in Q2, but that was still better than many other [...]
Another Record Low for Homes Under Construction
Posted in Economy, Macroeconomics, tagged Housing, Macroeconomics on August 16, 2011 | 2 Comments »
Today’s housing data showed that the number of single-family homes under construction hit another record low in July: Ten years ago, America’s home builders were in the midst of constructing 689,000 single-family homes. Five years ago, they were building 913,000 homes. Last year, they were building 278,000. And now that figure is down to a [...]
Groupon’s Explosive Growth Continues … As Do Its Losses
Posted in Business, Technology, tagged Business, Groupon, Internet on August 11, 2011 | 7 Comments »
Daily deal leader Groupon continues to grow its revenues at a jaw-dropping pace. According to its updated S-1 filing, the company sold $878 million in Groupons in the second quarter, ten times more than a year earlier: However, costs have been exploding too. Groupon spent almost $1 billion in Q2: Put it all together, and Groupon has been losing [...]
S&P’s $2 Trillion Error
Posted in Budget, Finance, Politics, tagged Budget, Debt, Deficit on August 7, 2011 | 22 Comments »
In the final hours before Friday’s historic downgrade, Standard & Poors gave Treasury an advance copy of its report. Amazingly, that report contained a $2 trillion error in its calculations of U.S. deficits and debt over the next decade. Here are four things you should know about it. 1. Treasury hoped that S&P would change its decision [...]
Five Things You Should Know About the S&P Downgrade
Posted in Budget, Finance, Politics, tagged Budget, Debt, Deficit, Interest Rates on August 5, 2011 | 11 Comments »
On Friday night, Standard and Poors announced that it was downgrading U.S. long-term sovereign debt from AAA to AA+, the first such downgrade in U.S. history. Here are five things you should know about the downgrade — four important, one trivia. 1. S&P downgraded U.S. debt not only because of the deteriorating fiscal outlook, but [...]
Better Than Feared, But Still Mediocre
Posted in Data, Economy, Macroeconomics, tagged Data, jobs, Macroeconomics, unemployment on August 5, 2011 | 4 Comments »
America’s job market has been down so long, today’s mediocre report looked like up. The headline figures — payrolls up 117,000, unemployment rate down a tic to 9.1% — were better than most forecasters anticipated. That’s a relief. And many details moved in the right direction as well. Revisions to May and June added another [...]
Spain’s 1575 Default
Posted in Budget, History, International, tagged Debt, Debt Limit, History, International, Spain on August 1, 2011 | 1 Comment »
If all goes according to plan, the hoopla over the debt limit will soon recede. Policymakers and analysts will move on to the next new thing. And, sadly, some fascinating questions will forever go unanswered. For example, which president would appear on the trillion-dollar coin? But if you are up for one last article about default, yesterday’s piece by [...]
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