Slowing even before the pandemic…
Category Archives: Uncategorized
Some High Frequency Indicators
Source: DB, “Covid-19 impact tracker,” US Economic Perspectives, 17 September 2020.
No Longer Does Sweden Beat US in Covid-19 Deaths per Capita
And the US is fast approaching Italy’s record.
Covid-19 Fatality Rates Rising Again
Not good news. Not that it was so great even before this.
Massive Wildfires in the West: Who Could’ve Guessed?
Sixteen years ago, the G.W. Bush White House suppressed for four years this report on global climate change impacts, which discussed, among other things, the increased prevalence of wildfires. This was discussed in this post, entitled “What the Administration Considered Too Dangerous to Release for Four Years”.
Nowcasts
Two-thirds of the way through Q3.
Figure 1: Reported GDP (black), Atlanta Fed GDPNow (green), IHS Markit (green), NY Fed nowcast (red), CBO August projection (blue). Source: BEA 2020Q2 2nd release, GDPNow, IHS Markit, NY Fed, and author’s calculations.
Business Cycle Indicators, September 4th
With today’s employment situation release, here’s a picture of five indicators tracked by the NBER’s Business Cycle Dating Committee (BCDC):
Howlers
Some people say the craziest things:
Teetering on the Precipice (Still)
Round 6 results of the FiveThirtyEight/IGM COVID-19 Economic Outlook Survey Series is out. Fivethirtyeight characterizes the results:
The Double Dip Cometh?
My base scenario is a slow recovery. However, I have always viewed — given the sheer incompetence of the Trump administration — the possibility of a double dip recession as a real one. Today, Diane Swonk lays out the case: