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Strategies & Market Trends : Booms, Busts, and Recoveries -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Don Lloyd who wrote (20709)	7/3/2002 4:05:43 PM
From: AC Flyer	Read Replies (5) \| Respond to of 74559

Hi Don: >>highly controversial<< I guess you're referring to hedonistics again, Don. The data is so strong that even you hedonists ;-) will have trouble rationalizing it. *Growth:* 5.6% GDP growth in 1Q '02. business.firstunion.com ISM May 2002 55.7 business.firstunion.com *Productivity:* The revised seasonally adjusted annual rates of productivity change in the first quarter were 8.3 percent in the business sector and 8.4 percent in the nonfarm business sector. In manufacturing, the revised productivity changes in the first quarter were 9.4 percent in manufacturing, 13.3 percent in durable goods manufacturing, and 4.6 percent in nondurable goods manufacturing. (Try and rationalize away those numbers). bls.gov *Inflation:* The Consumer Price Index for All Urban Consumers (CPI-U) was unchanged in May, before seasonal adjustment....The May level of 179.8 (1982-84=100) was 1.2 percent higher than its level in May 2001. bls.gov Producer Price Index.....From May 2001 to May 2002, prices for finished goods declined 2.7 percent. Over the same period, the index for finished energy goods moved down 15.0 percent, the finished consumer foods index fell 2.0 percent, and prices for finished goods other than foods and energy edged up 0.1 percent. Prices received by producers of intermediate goods declined 3.1 percent for the 12 months ended May 2002, and the index for crude goods decreased 15.8 percent during the same period. (Inflation problem - not!) bls.gov *Employment Cost:* The Employment Cost Index for total compensation increased 3.9 percent (civilian workers, not seasonally adjusted) for the year ended March 2002. (Maybe that's why consumer spending is so robust) bls.gov

To: Don Lloyd who wrote (20709)	7/4/2002 1:03:07 AM
From: Raymond Duray	Respond to of 74559

OFFICIAL GOVERNMENT MYTHS AND LIES, formerly known as statistics Don, Re: ...Right now we have solid growth, high productivity and low inflation. ... I just wanted to note that the reality of these three items is highly controversial. 1) GDP growth - Q1 2002 was distorted by intentional front loading of DoD spending to come in later quarters. This is much akin to the infamous bookkeeping that Global Crossing and Qwest are now being accused of using to deceive the public with inflated income. Same trick. 2) high productivity - Not only is "productivity" a useless measure in a service economy, it is also the case that productivity rose as the U.S. entered the Great Depression. 3) low inflation - The BLS statistics have been revised several times in recent years to mask the actual rate of inflation in order to suppress COLA adjustments in Social Security and other pension schemes, as well as government pay scales in general. True inflation is much more severe than the "official" statistics are indicating. -Ray