A couple of weeks ago we received the encouraging news that retail sales for both January and February were 1.8% above December. On Monday the National Association of Realtors reported that February sales of existing homes were 5.1% above January levels on a seasonally adjusted basis. Today the Census Bureau reported that new orders for manufactured durable goods rose 3.4% in February, with new orders for nondefense capital goods up 7.4%. And also today the Census Bureau reported that new home sales in February were up 4.7% (on a seasonally adjusted basis) relative to January. Is the tide starting to turn?
The Stimulus Package Considered against a Deteriorating Macro Backdrop
Here are the latest CBO forecasts of the output gap and unemployment rate, as well as counterfactual gap and rate that would have taken place in the absence of the stimulus package.
The first votes are in
The Federal Reserve can’t be entirely pleased with markets’ reaction to its announcement on Wednesday of quantitative goals for purchases of long-term assets.
2009 NCAA Bracket: Round 1
Congratulations to J. Graham, who successfully predicted 7 of the 10 NCAA round 1 upsets to lead the
2009 NCAA Bracket Econbrowser Challenge and come in ahead of 99.9% of the global ESPN entries. The future for Graham 1 does not look so bright, however, since Wakeforest’s first-round loss blew a pretty big hole in the rest of that nice bracket.
Guest Post: President Obama’s Plan to Improve Small Business Credit
By Robert Fairlie
Today, we’re fortunate to have Rob Fairlie, UC Santa Cruz Professor of Economics as a guest blogger. Some of his work was discussed in this earlier post.
On Monday, President Obama announced a plan to unfreeze capital for small businesses (see here). With the potential of creating new jobs and helping the country move out of the recession, the White House offered several actions to help small businesses obtain the capital that they need. The financial crisis has taken a devastating toll on entrepreneurs as capital has become increasingly scarce. This year’s projections for loans guaranteed by the Small Business Administration are down to $10 billion, which is half the amount of loans guaranteed last year.
Quantitative easing
The U.S. Federal Reserve yesterday finally took the step many of us had been urging for some time.
2009 NCAA Bracket Econbrowser Challenge
OK, I said I wouldn’t give you any hints, but decided to pass one along anyway. Here are President Obama’s picks.
AIG outrage
New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo (hat tip: LA Times) asserted that on Friday insurance company AIG, recipient so far of perhaps $170 billion in bailout assistance, distributed over $160 million in “retention payments to members of its Financial Products Subsidiary.” These payments apparently included “retention” payments of over $1 million each to eleven individuals who are no longer working at AIG.
It’s tournament time!
I know, you’ve been regretting all year that you didn’t get a chance to enter the the 2008 NCAA Bracket Econbrowser Challenge. Well guess what? Here it is March of 2009 and you have a brand new chance!
GDP Forecasts from the WSJ
With talk of a second stimulus package circulating, it’s of interest to see what the current forecasts are indicating about the depth of the recession, as well as the “bounceback”. Jim has presented some of his views here. In this post, I examine the implications of the consensus coming from the March WSJ survey article, which indicates continued deterioration in the outlook, but a recovery beginning in 2009Q3.