The Way We Were, Are, and Oh Well!

I am feeling very uninterested today; there being a wealth of material out there, but no motivation in here. I suppose I will present the Reader with this link, which is a measure of the inputs into the economy; which suggests that the Ton-mileage is not up to economic momentum. I agree with the assessment, though I must admit that a switch to train traffic may have occurred, or the truckers may have had the weather gauge with them (reference to Master and Commander, which I watched again last night). It might also be possible that the loads might have been lighter–indicating a higher transference of Finished Goods rather than stocked Materials; an actual improvement in the economic cycle. The more likely aspect, though, is that the economic momentum shares as much hype as did the original Stimulus program–huge dollars with little Produce.

I can present this link to pretend I want to inform Anyone of Anything this morning! Maybe I should do something like a Reality Check, like News rooms do. The big firms have slowed laying off Jobs basically because they are done; larger firms still needing necessary labor, while knowing exactly how much labor they will need under most circumstances. Small firms really don’t know how many people they can afford to keep when striated economic change occurs. They get started late in the layoff period. It is also true that the small firms are not really starved for Credit; they are starved for Customers. The great Recovery may be nothing more than a traditional Spring season with increased labor rolls. Check out the graphs in the Post; there has been no great Shot in the Arm of energy, and the higher Wages simply state that firms are intent on keeping their current force.

The last commentary is also misleading. The higher Wages Are reflective of the huge increase in health care costs–resulting in huge increases in health care insurance premiums. I have no way to quantify this increase–but it probably equals at least 60% of the Wage increase. The perceptive should notice that these are business to business financial transfers; meaning that there is almost no change at the Consumption level for Households or Retail Outlets. We have to get the Stimulus out of the corporate boardrooms for it to be truly Stimulus. We still have not gotten it out of the banks as yet! lgl