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Yep, we have such clear warning signs of imminent disaster. I should probably also point out that the interest burden measured as a share of GDP (net of money refunded from the Fed) is at the lowest level since before World War II. You can see we are imposing a terrible burden on our children. At least the Post is honest and says that its deficit reduction means cutting Social Security and Medicare.
Oh well, here on Planet Earth low interest rates and low inflation are a very good market signal that the economy could use much more demand (i.e. larger budget deficits). The Post actually seems to support this, but tells us about the Congressional Budget Office’s (CBO) projection of higher deficits in future years. As we pointed out yesterday, those higher deficits are the result of CBO’s projection that interest rates will rise sharply. They have a great track record of being badly wrong on this score six years in a row. I suppose seventh time could be a charm, but I wouldn’t bet on it.
Anyhow, serious people would be worried about boosting the economy now and putting people back to work. People are suffering today and our children our suffering. This is both because we have plenty of money so that they don’t have to drink lead and also because putting their parents out of work is a horrible thing to do to kids.
Yep, we have such clear warning signs of imminent disaster. I should probably also point out that the interest burden measured as a share of GDP (net of money refunded from the Fed) is at the lowest level since before World War II. You can see we are imposing a terrible burden on our children. At least the Post is honest and says that its deficit reduction means cutting Social Security and Medicare.
Oh well, here on Planet Earth low interest rates and low inflation are a very good market signal that the economy could use much more demand (i.e. larger budget deficits). The Post actually seems to support this, but tells us about the Congressional Budget Office’s (CBO) projection of higher deficits in future years. As we pointed out yesterday, those higher deficits are the result of CBO’s projection that interest rates will rise sharply. They have a great track record of being badly wrong on this score six years in a row. I suppose seventh time could be a charm, but I wouldn’t bet on it.
Anyhow, serious people would be worried about boosting the economy now and putting people back to work. People are suffering today and our children our suffering. This is both because we have plenty of money so that they don’t have to drink lead and also because putting their parents out of work is a horrible thing to do to kids.
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Yesterday the Labor Department released data from its December Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey (JOLTS). One of the items that got lots of attention was a rise in the quit rate to its highest level of the recovery. In fact, it is now pretty much back to pre-recession levels. (This is especially true of workers in the public sector — interesting story for another day.)
While it is good news if workers feel they can leave a job where they are unhappy or which does not fully utilize their skills, the news may not be as good as it first appears. The weak labor market of the last seven years led to very low quit rates. This means that many people who would have left their jobs in a more normal labor market stayed at their job because they were worried about finding a new one. As a result, we should expect there are many more people at jobs they would like to leave in early 2016 than would be the case say in 2007 before the recession hit.
The implication would be that quit rates should not just be returning to their pre-recession level, but rather they should rise substantially above their pre-recession level, at least for a period of time. I’m not sure whether this makes sense or not. We don’t have data on quit rates prior to 2000, so we can’t look back at what happened after prior recoveries from a steep downturn.
Anyhow, it seems plausible to me that the quit rate should be elevated for a period of time to compensate for the unusually low quit rate of prior years. If someone wants to tell me why this is wrong, I’m listening.
Yesterday the Labor Department released data from its December Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey (JOLTS). One of the items that got lots of attention was a rise in the quit rate to its highest level of the recovery. In fact, it is now pretty much back to pre-recession levels. (This is especially true of workers in the public sector — interesting story for another day.)
While it is good news if workers feel they can leave a job where they are unhappy or which does not fully utilize their skills, the news may not be as good as it first appears. The weak labor market of the last seven years led to very low quit rates. This means that many people who would have left their jobs in a more normal labor market stayed at their job because they were worried about finding a new one. As a result, we should expect there are many more people at jobs they would like to leave in early 2016 than would be the case say in 2007 before the recession hit.
The implication would be that quit rates should not just be returning to their pre-recession level, but rather they should rise substantially above their pre-recession level, at least for a period of time. I’m not sure whether this makes sense or not. We don’t have data on quit rates prior to 2000, so we can’t look back at what happened after prior recoveries from a steep downturn.
Anyhow, it seems plausible to me that the quit rate should be elevated for a period of time to compensate for the unusually low quit rate of prior years. If someone wants to tell me why this is wrong, I’m listening.
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