Update to this post. Official Chinese statistics indicate 6.3% y/y growth in Q2. Maybe it’s less?
Guest Contribution: Model update and disagreement among recession models
Today we are fortunate to be able to present a guest contribution written by Rashad Ahmed (Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, US Treasury). The views presented are solely those of the author, and do not necessarily represent the views of the US Treasury, or any other organizations the author is affiliated with.
Better to Light One Candle than Curse the Darkness*: Real Wage Edition
We live in an age where tons of data are easily available. It is highly unlikely that the US government is suppressing data, e.g., median hourly wage data, in an effort to provide an overly optimistic picture of the US economy. That’s an unlikely conspiracy.
Inflation in July: Central Tendency Down
Headline and core y/y CPI inflation undershoots slightly Bloomberg consensus (by 0.1%) (and below Cleveland Fed nowcast for headline of 0.4% m/m, see yesterday’s post). Overall, trend is down even if headline y/y is ticks up slightly.
Chinese Inflation in July
Year-on-year CPI inflation goes negative (-0.3% vs. -0.4% consensus), and month-on-month is positive.
CPI Inflation at Annual Rates, using July Nowcast
From Cleveland Fed; and compared to Bloomberg consensus.
Chinese Growth in Question (Again)
Official Chinese statistics indicate 6.3% y/y growth in Q2. Maybe it’s less?
The Downgrade, the Debt Crisis and the Macro Outlook
Join me at 7 p.m. CT on UW Alumni Association’s TheUWNow livestream (via YouTube), where I’ll be joined by Conference Board Chief Economist Dana Peterson in discussing “The US Credit Rating and You” (moderated by Mike Knetter).
A Rolling Recession from a Rolling Expansion?
I see increasing speculation ([1] , [2]) that we might avoid a recession by virtue of having rolling recessions. Usually, the argument is that the slowdowns are hitting different industries, although one could also take a geographical view. Here I discuss both the industry and geographical variation.
“First thing we do, let’s gag all the economists”: China Edition
Apologies (as always) to Shakespeare. From Sun Yu in the FT: