{"id":41453,"date":"2018-12-08T11:13:59","date_gmt":"2018-12-08T16:13:59","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/?p=41453"},"modified":"2018-12-08T11:13:59","modified_gmt":"2018-12-08T16:13:59","slug":"paper-lanterns","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/?p=41453","title":{"rendered":"Paper Lanterns"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"art-postmetadataheader\"><\/div>\n<div class=\"art-postcontent\">\n<h3><a href=\"https:\/\/acting-man.com\/?p=53885\">Paper Lanterns<\/a><\/h3>\n<p><strong>Mud Volcanoes<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>There are numerous explanations for just what in the heck is going on with the economy.\u00a0 Some are good.\u00a0 Many are bad.\u00a0 Today we\u2019ll do our part to bring clarity to disorder\u2026<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/acting-man.com\/blog\/media\/2018\/12\/1-Unemployment-and-Claims.png\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter wp-image-53886\" src=\"https:\/\/acting-man.com\/blog\/media\/2018\/12\/1-Unemployment-and-Claims-1024x1013.png\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 640px) 100vw, 640px\" srcset=\"https:\/\/acting-man.com\/blog\/media\/2018\/12\/1-Unemployment-and-Claims-1024x1013.png 1024w, https:\/\/acting-man.com\/blog\/media\/2018\/12\/1-Unemployment-and-Claims-300x297.png 300w, https:\/\/acting-man.com\/blog\/media\/2018\/12\/1-Unemployment-and-Claims-768x760.png 768w\" alt=\"\" width=\"640\" height=\"633\" \/><\/a>Two data series it is worth paying attention to at the moment: the unemployment rate (U3) and initial claims. As the chart at the top shows, when the former makes a low it is time to worry about the economy. Low points in the U3 UE rate slightly lead the beginning of recessions. Claims on the other hand are near coincident indicators of the stock market, this is to say, lows in initial claims tend to happen within a time period of four to six weeks surrounding major stock market peaks (in most cases they lead slightly, but small lags have occasionally occurred as well). Note: neither indicator confirms an imminent turning point as of yet \u2013 initial claims would e.g. have to rise to around 300k in order to do so. The same is true of other major recession indicators, their most recent readings do not yet confirm that the business cycle is about to turn down. However, there is a lot of circumstantial evidence that indicates such a downturn may soon be confirmed, including recent market moves (i.e., deteriorating stock prices and rising credit spreads). [PT]<\/p>\n<p>Several backward looking economic fundamentals show all is well.\u00a0Third quarter gross domestic product increased at an annual rate of 3.5 percent.\u00a0And the unemployment rate, if you exclude something called discouraged workers, is just 3.7 percent \u2013 a near 50 year low.\u00a0 By these metrics, the economy\u2019s never been better.<\/p>\n<p>&#8230;click on the above link to read the rest of the article&#8230;<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Paper Lanterns Mud Volcanoes There are numerous explanations for just what in the heck is going on with the economy.\u00a0 Some are good.\u00a0 Many are bad.\u00a0 Today we\u2019ll do our part to bring clarity to disorder\u2026 &nbsp; Two data series it is worth paying attention to at the moment: the unemployment rate (U3) and initial [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[5728,353,11763],"class_list":["post-41453","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-economics","tag-acting-man","tag-gdp","tag-mn-gordon"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41453","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=41453"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41453\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":41454,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41453\/revisions\/41454"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=41453"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=41453"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=41453"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}