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Demographics is Still Destiny

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Just about 12 hours after this post goes up, the world will see the ADP Employment Report for July. We can expect it to show a net gain of about 240k jobs, about the same as the 237k gained in June. It’s a decent number, higher than the 220k or so averaged last year at this time, but what does it really mean?

Context is the key to understanding the data that drives our world, so let’s get going with some solid background on what these figures mean. It’s time for a few charts and graphs once again to demonstrate just how strong things really are going into the magic period where Baby Boomers start to retire in droves – sometime after 2017.

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Growth is … ?

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“Anyone who believes exponential growth can go on forever in a finite world is either a madman or an economist.”
– Kenneth Boulding

The figure for growth in Gross Domestic Product (GDP) growth for the second quarter came in, and it wasn’t bad – 2.3%, and the revision to the first quarter was a positive if sluggish 0.6%. Like so many economic figures it’s not great but it’s also not bad. We’re still muddling through this year hoping to make it through to better times ahead.

But will there be better times? The Federal Reserve accidentally posted on its website, briefly, some internal estimates from their own economists that show that where 2015 and 2016 won’t be too bad, with growth in the 2.3-2.4% range, it may taper off after that. But can we expect better? Should we, for that matter, expect more growth from the economy?

Or is one of the big changes in this new economy a much lower growth rate than we are used to?

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Fight for $15

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The fight for a $15 per hour minimum wage is the hottest issue among progressive Democrats today. There has been a lot of progress as cities including Seattle and Los Angeles have passed this as their minimum wage, as has the entire state of New York (but only for “fast food” workers, strangely). It would be a big hike from today’s $7.25 per hour, a 106% increase that swamps any previous jump. President Obama, and many Democrats, favor a smaller $12 per hour rate as something of a compromise.

But where did these numbers come from? Why are they important? What effects would a minimum wage rise have on the economy? It’s worth spending some time looking at the postwar history of the minimum wage, from 1947 to 2015, to see where we are today and what it means.

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End “Quarterly Capitalism”!

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“It was this administration which saved the system of private profit and free enterprise after it had been dragged to the brink of ruin.”
– President Franklin Delano Roosevelt, bragging a little.

It’s a common belief that the right wing in the US is the political alignment of business. They stand for lower taxes, lower regulation, and a generally lighter hand on the economy. That may work out well in good times, but hard times call for more. It’s when things get dark that the true Liberals, capital “L”, stand up and make things happen.

Hillary Clinton, with a good shot at being the FDR we really need, may just have stepped up to do that.

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Fear Doesn’t Glitter

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“All money is a matter of belief.”
– Adam Smith

Gold is taking a solid beating these days. It’s been slipping for a while, but when China revealed that it’s reserves were less than believed it really fell – quickly slipping below $1,100 per ounce when one mysterious trader dumped everything. It’s now more than a third off its 2010 peak and nearly everyone believes that it’s doomed to slip below $1,000 per ounce by the end of the year.

What happened? Isn’t gold the ultimate money in an unstable world? The short answer is no, and this has as much to do with the rise of the US Dollar as anything. But in the end gold is not as much a form of money as it is a barometer of fear – a commodity that appears to be in much shorter supply today than it was just a few years ago.

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