Silicon Investor (SI) -- The First Internet Community

STOCKTALK

We've detected that you're using an ad content blocking browser plug-in or feature. Ads provide a critical source of revenue to the continued operation of Silicon Investor. We ask that you disable ad blocking while on Silicon Investor in the best interests of our community. If you are not using an ad blocker but are still receiving this message, make sure your browser's tracking protection is set to the 'standard' level.

Strategies & Market Trends : 2026 TeoTwawKi ... 2032 Darkest Interregnum -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Joe S Pack who wrote (43514)	12/5/2008 7:48:09 PM
From: gg cox	4 Recommendations Respond to of 218916

A Japanese company ( Toyota ) and an American company (GM) decided to > have a canoe race on the Missouri River. Both teams practiced long and > hard to reach their peak performance before the race. > > On the big day, the Japanese won by a mile. > > The Americans, very discouraged and depressed, decided to investigate the > reason for the crushing defeat. A management team made up of senior > management was formed to investigate and recommend appropriate action. > > Their conclusion was the Japanese had 8 people rowing and 1 person > steering, while the American team had 8 people steering and 1 person > rowing. > > Feeling a deeper study was in order, American management hired a > consulting company and paid them a large amount of money for a second > opinion. > > They advised, of course, that too many people were steering the boat, > while not enough people were rowing. > > Not sure of how to utilize that information, but wanting to prevent > another loss to the Japanese, the rowing team's management structure was > totally reorganized to 4 steering supervisors, 3 area steering > superintendents, and 1 assistant superintendent steering manager. > > They also implemented a new performance system that would give the 1 > person rowing the boat greater incentive to work harder. It was called > the 'Rowing Team Quality First Program,' with meetings, dinners, and free > pens for the rower.. There was discussion of getting new paddles, canoes, > and other equipment, extra vacation days for practices and bonuses. > > The next year the Japanese won by two miles. > > Humiliated, the American management laid off the rower for poor > performance, halted development of a new canoe, sold the paddles, and > canceled all capital investments for new equipment. The money saved was > distributed to the Senior Executives as bonuses and the next year's > racing team was out-sourced to India. > > Sadly.............. The End. > > Here's something else to think about: > GM has spent the last thirty years moving all its factories out of the > US , claiming they can't make money paying American wages. > > TOYOTA has spent the last thirty years building more than a dozen plants > inside the US. The last quarter's results: > > TOYOTA makes 4 billion in profits while GM racked up 9 billion in losses. >

To: Joe S Pack who wrote (43514)	12/5/2008 11:45:26 PM
From: Don Earl	Respond to of 218916

I'm not sure if we're talking about the same thing. Today's report was about jobs that have been cut altogether. I was thinking your mention of December numbers was the weekly figures for new claims for unemployment. Either way, I think the temporary positions created even in a slack retail environment will skew what we see this month enough to make it look less bad than it really is. Back in the late 90s, when computer jobs were plentiful and well paying, the weekly new claims numbers usually came in around 300K to 325K. That was in what was generally viewed as being a fairly tight labor market, with very low unemployment. I don't know how the Wall Street ANALysts come up with their predictions, but I think you could get fairly close by taking the new claims data and subtracting something around 390K per week to get an idea how many jobs are vanishing. I forget what the four week moving average is for new claims. Around 520,000? I think that's pretty close. So, if employment is flat with new claims in the 390,000 range, that would give you 130,000 job cuts per week if new claims are at 520,000. My memory isn't perfect, but I think that's fairly consistent with the numbers you quoted. In fact, I think you could accurately project recession/recovery in real time running, based on weekly claims alone. Take 390,000 and subtract the actual number. Positive numbers indicate recovery, negative indicate recession. When business conditions are good, companies hire extra employees to handle the increased demand for goods and services, and pay higher wages to retain their best people. When business is bad, they fire everyone in sight. I wouldn't touch this market long until weekly claims are down around 350,000. PS: Just for grins, I pulled up a couple charts to double check the above. The first is weekly claims from the 90s to 2004, the second is a ten year Dow chart. You could just about nail market tops and bottoms dead on with nothing more than weekly claim trends above or below right around 400K. bigpicture.typepad.com bigcharts.marketwatch.com Interesting, yes?