Tuesday, November 18, 2014

Recession News - It will be late and mild

Well, this month brings something similar to good news. The numbers I have been seeing for the past several weeks are saying the recession is likely to wait several more months and is likely to be milder than I expected.  Here in the U.S., that is. The recession seems to be right on schedule in Europe and already started in Japan.

Of course if you bet heavily on us going into recession, this might be bad news.  I never bet heavily on any particular direction, and thus never lose a lot.  Never make a lot either. (Bit of my humor there.)

All though the past year or so, I saw copper losing ground, which is an indicator that manufacturing was weaker than everyone thought.  And then oil prices began to drop.  That is always a sign that a recession is beginning. And it is.  Just not here. The Department of Labor's statistics said this month that the U.S. added 170,000 manufacturing jobs in the past year.  While that is not spectacular, it is substantial.

What appears to be happening is some of the manufacturing that used to be overseas is now happening here in the U.S.  And what about that drop in oil prices? Well despite the Obama administration attempts to block oil production anywhere they could, oil and gas exploration and extraction has increased everywhere that the Fed's don't have jurisdiction.

Now, when the rest of the world goes into recession, it will have an effect on us.  But the effect will not be as bad as we once feared. On the other hand, things will not get better at any appreciable rate for as far into the future as I can forecast.

It may be noted that I don't have any links this month.  Just ran out of energy.
Will try to do better in the next few weeks.