Teaching statistics next semester, adding in this section, which I am tempted to name the “EJ Antoni Memorial Module”.
“The Misuse of Statistics” Module in Stats Class [Extended]
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Clifford Winston: “Academic Toadies Impair Government Performance”
From The Regulatory Review, Clifford Winston:
The Trump Administration’s hiring of academics who compromise disciplinary standards threatens effective governance.
“Is the US already in recession?”
Tej Parikh in FT inquires.
Mid-Session Review Technical Supplement Is Out
As of yesterday, here.
How’s Manufacturing Doing?
Since “Liberation Day”, so-so:
Trouble in Estimating Seasonals As a Reason for the Low NFP Growth?
NEC Director Hassett makes reference to a GS note that indicates that August preliminary figures typically get revised up (NBCNews) The GS note (Walkers/Rindel, Sept 4) cites a 61K downward bias in preliminary vs. third release… so +22 becomes +83K.
“The data are pretty clear that we are not in a recession.”
If you think that’s Kevin Hassett opining, you’d be wrong. It’s actually CEA Chair Ed Lazear on May 8, 2008. NBER retrospectively determined that the business cycle peak was December 2007, so that a recession was underway for four months by that time. Today, NEC Chair Kevin Hassett stated “I don’t see any sign of recession”
Why Did Mr. Trump Say before the Employment Release “the real numbers”…”will be in a year from now on”?
[source] Answer: Because, by virtue of the Executive Office of the President getting the release numbers the night before, he knew the numbers were going to be pretty bad (+22K < +75K Bloomberg consensus). (By the way, if I as a EOP staff member gave away market moving news before the official release, I would’ve been fired, and prosecuted. Just sayin’).
Employment in the Context of Business Cycle Indicators
With NFP at +22K < +75K Bloomberg consensus (hinted at by Trump signaling “pay no heed to the numbers behind the curtain”), we have the following picture of key indicators of the NBER’s BCDC (including the 48K downward revision in previous two months):
Yield Curves over the Last Year
The yield curve at the short end is almost as inverted as it was in November 2024. In fact, it’s more inverted than on January 21st, 2025, the day after Trump’s inauguration. Yet, at the long end of the spectrum, 30 year yields are back up to January 21st levels.