I'll take it under revisement.

Good Morning.

Up the down stair case.

Lagging indicator discount sales.

Now this is a tight range:

ECB: euro-zone growth seen at 0.5% to 2.3% in 2011

So, given the recent Hindenburg Omen fun, where all the bears were lured in for a 2.5% shearing, I wonder if the bull are being set up next....

I mean, it's been a super-easy way to make money...... set your GTC buy order for DIA at 100. Lather, rinse, repeat.

That works, of course.... until it doesn't.

(COME ON MARKET...... ONE TIME!!!!!)

Eric wrote:

suggests, but no italics.....

Maybe voted against italics at this week's meeting. We'll have to wait until the minutes are released. This could signal a fundamental change in CR's stance.

So the "beat" was 3k jobs, and was last week's revision "down"?

Cinco-X wrote:

So the "beat" was 3k jobs, and was last week's revision "down"?

Yes from 473,000 to 478,000.

Cinco-X wrote:

So the "beat" was 3k jobs, and was last week's revision "down"?

CR wrote:

Claims for last week were revised up from 473,000 to 478,000. So the level this week is about the same as initially reported last week.

U.S. Avoids Recession as Data Can’t Get Much Worse (Update1) - Bloomberg.com

"The U.S. economy is so bad that the chance of avoiding a double dip back into recession may actually be pretty good."

What a positive spin. Try this for size: when you're dead, you no longer have to fear death.

.....on par in the past with about September 2001.........I'm trying to remember if anything of any consequence happened then.......hmmmm......

Good Morning, Peoples!

Could A Family Of Four Possibly Live On $50K These Days?

Back to the Future

Two struggling units of Lehman Brothers Holdings, the bankrupt U.S. investment bank, need hundreds of millions of dollars in capital to stave off failure that could cost Lehman billions, court documents show.

By the end of that sentence, I had lost a significant number of brain synapses who flung themselves to their deaths rather than keep processing what I was reading. Lehman units failing in August? What could be bad about that?

yourapostasy wrote:

we could be treading water or even improving at the margins,

......I even could believe "improving at the margins". Most of the big firms' financials were up mostly through belt-tightening, tax relief schemes, but not extra sales....

The four-week average dropped 0.005%!!!! Fantastic!!!

This should help with those pending home sales....new home sales ...auto sales and so on....the market loves it.

amiramr0 wrote on Thu, 9/2/2010 - 7:43 am
Now this is a tight range:
ECB: euro-zone growth seen at 0.5% to 2.3% in 2011

2.3% is the preliminary and .5% is the final number?

Articles like that make me frustrated Cinco-X. Rather than explain how a family could easily live on $50k, it creates all these false impressions. Utilities are not fixed, they are variable. Ours rarely top $100/month, even in the summer heat of Georgia. You don't need an expensive internet/cable package of $100 (we get by on $25/month).You don't need two $400/month leased cars, buy used ones for a fraction of the cost, own them outright and save that money. There that's ~$1,000/month I saved them in about 30 seconds, increasing their post-tax take home by 24% compared to their overall salary.

The key to cashflow in America, is not what you make, it's how you spend it.

traderwalt wrote:

2.3% is the preliminary and .5% is the final number?

2012 is the final number.

chapel_of_words wrote:

The key to cashflow in America, is not what you make, it's how you spend it.

In my humble opinion, the key to cashflow in the United States is continuing to extend UE benefits.

Washington Post is on board the recovery train.

Five reasons for economic optimism

Savings

The savings rate rose from 2.7 percent at the start of the recession, in the beginning of 2008, to 5.9 percent in July. That means households are farther along in readjusting their spending patterns to match their incomes than was previously realized. That should make them freer to spend more in the months ahead.

Credit

Gradual healing is underway in the financial sector, making loans more available for households and businesses. The most recent edition of the Federal Reserve's senior loan officers survey showed that more banks have eased lending standards for corporate loans. For companies with access to global capital markets, interest rates remain quite low, which supports growth.

Manufacturing

The industrial sector is actually holding up. July industrial production was up 1 percent, and early indicators show that the expansion continued last month. The Institute for Supply Management said Wednesday that its index of activity in the manufacturing sector rose in August, to 56.3 from 55.5 (numbers above 50 indicate expansion). It appears that manufacturers view final demand for their products as steady enough to keep producing.

Housing

No one is expecting home-building activity to return to pre-crisis levels for a very long time. But in July, builders began building new housing units at a paltry annual rate of 546,000 annual rate, less than half of what's needed to keep up with population growth. The housing market just can't contract that much more. When housing starts fell from a 2.3 million annual rate in early 2006 to the low of 477,000 in April 2009, it was a major drain on the economy, but a decline of that scale is now mathematically impossible.

Trade

A steep rise in imports dragged down the economy in the second quarter to an unprecedented degree. If the trade deficit had not widened, the gross domestic product would have grown at a healthy 5 percent annual rate. With many other world economies doing better than the U.S. economy right now, exports may be set to rise more than imports in the coming quarters, which would help domestic growth.

chapel_of_words wrote:

There that's ~$1,000/month I saved them in about 30 seconds, increasing their post-tax take home by 24% compared to their overall salary.

Of course, they low balled a bunch of the other figures, especially housing. At the beginning of the article, they stated in effect that half of the country live with less income than that, so obviously it can be done. It's just hard to save when you're living like that....

Elvis wrote:

In my humble opinion, the key to cashflow in the United States is continuing to extend UE benefits.

An acquaintance of mine just ran out her 99 weeks.

During that 99 weeks, she continued to see a personal trainer, and go out clubbing.

*In my humble opinion, the key to cashflow in the United States is continuing to extending UE benefits. *

Been there, done that. The shock of going from your salary take-home to UE benefits is big. But it teaches you a great deal about what costs you can cut, what it really takes to get by. Maintaining those habits after leaving UE benefits is the key to not having to worry about it again. Too many folks take the new boost in income as justification to continue past bad habits.

Eric wrote:

During that 99 weeks, she continued to see a personal trainer,

He was probably "hawt"...

Out: Clubbing baby seals

In: Clubbing till the money runs out

Vonbek777 wrote:

U.S. Avoids Recession as Data Can’t Get Much Worse (Update1) - Bloomberg.com

It has come up red 4 times in a row, the next spin has to be black.

Juvenal Delinquent wrote:

In: Clubbing till the money runs out
In: Clubbing till credit is cut

chapel_of_words wrote:

Too many folks take the new boost in income as justification to continue past bad habits.

.....kinda like our many branches of government.....vis a vis all new taxes

chapel_of_words wrote:

Lehman units failing in August? What could be bad about that?

Nothing, if you are TBTF. Mo money!

chapel_of_words wrote:

No...it's really not.

It's not that I disagree with your premise, it's just that if it were easy, everyone would be doing it. I have no CC debt, I finish paying for my new car in about 4 months, no mortgage, and recently bought a house with cash and a 401k loan that runs me a couple of hundred a month. Yes, people can live frugally, but it is NOT easy. It takes dedication and discipline. If it were easy, everyone would be doing it.

Geithner out and Bloomberg (and Warren) in?

Obama Flirting With Bloomberg Behind Geithner’s Back? -- Daily Intel

WSJ: HP raises bid for 3PAR to $33 a share.

Cinco-X wrote:

Yes, people can live frugally, but it is NOT easy. It takes dedication and discipline. If it were easy, everyone would be doing it.

......like quitting smoking or booze, it's a lifestyle change. Initially tough - subsequently a no-brainer. More people aren't doing it because they have the "Keeping Up Disease"; buying all the cool sh**.

Time to Milk.........Hasta........

*It takes dedication and discipline. *

Change is never easy. That's why so few do it I think. Wasn't it Heinlen, "People will never change until the pain of remaining the same exceeds the pain of changing." But part of the problem is many have a false notion that it can't be done, that there's some sort of structural or natural law obstacle. As you pointed out, dedication and discipline, are entirely within the control of the person. I've pointed out to people that they'll spend 2600 hours a year working for a boss, who they hope, out of some sliver and shred of optimism, will give them a 2-5% cost of living raise at the end of the year. Whereas if they just spent, say, 1% of that time a month, learning how to spend less (or not spend at all) they could produce the equivilant of a 20-40% net take home increase in available money.

Israeli entrepreneurs: MBAs are for wusses | The Economist

WSJ: HP raises bid for 3PAR to $33 a share.

Did Dell raise the price and I missed it? Or is HP just reflexively outbidding itself? Kind of like they put in two EBay orders on the same item and forgot to turn one off.

And yet people still can't be bothered to take an extra 5seconds to read the label and buy the generic.

Not guilty.

Don't even dare ask them to take a few minutes to organize coupons.

Guilty. Having a decent job results in a certain amount of complacency.

On a similar note, a recent article about HEB, aTexas based grocery chain that has grown in spite of the Walmart onslaught, talked about an exercise that the CEO assigned his top executives. They were told to shop their store assuming they were feeding a family of four on $25 or $50 a week. This is how the CEO retained their country, working class heritage even throughout their expansion into upper class neighborhoods.

chapel_of_words wrote:

Did Dell raise the price and I missed it? Or is HP just reflexively outbidding itself? Kind of like they put in two EBay orders on the same item and forgot to turn one off.

I didn't hear about Dell increasing their bid, I think HP is taking a preemptive strike, and 3PAR enjoying every minute of it.

Edit: they did: H-P raises 3Par bid to $33 a share - MarketWatch

During that 99 weeks, she continued to see a personal trainer, and go out clubbing.

Pretty sensible if you ask me. She is likely setting herself up to be famous for being famous like Paris Hilton or LiLo. If that fails she will be in good enough shape to rake in some spinning on brass poles.

chapel_of_words wrote:

Don't even dare ask them to take a few minutes to organize coupons

PULEEEEEEEASE.

More Cost shifting. And some fking how I always end up behind one of the chumps that has a handful of those crumpled up coupons in line at the grocery - waiting while the ice cream melts in my cart.

They are supposed to do that, often I find missing ones on some products or class of products...and those that aren't updated and scan for a different price.

Its so ingrained in me, I couldn't stop doing it if I wanted to. Thats the future that won't die easily once it is re-instilled. We are early in this trend so this behavior is uneven currently. You do see some of this showing up otherwise, the latest example are the bleak numbers coming out of restaurants. There's another factor and that is of value. I will pay more if the value is better. Cheaper doesn't always equate to better. There are some products I will pay more for with cheaper options sitting by their side. Todays industrialized farming means something completely different in the cost/value and now safety of those things you put in your mouth.

Don't even dare ask them to take a few minutes to organize coupons.

...ya know, the real test is whether you save green stamps.

Portends is a much classier word than suggests.

hiker90 wrote:

Engineering is not that funny.

You should visit The Daily WTF: Curious Perversions in Information Technology, if you don't already.

Nov 3 8A - Morning in America.

*nd some fking how I always end up behind one of the chumps that has a handful of those crumpled up coupons in line at the grocery - waiting while the ice cream melts in my cart. *

Pick your evil: More time spent in line at the grocery market behind coupon puller or or more taxes paid to the government so the person in front of you won't have to pull coupons?

OT, I went to the local broker's meeting yesterday,closings were strong,with few deals falling out. One newly opened escrow. 21 price reductions.23 buyers reported looking for specific kinds of property. Price reductions ran fro a low of 10%,most were in the 20% range.52 agents were present. Most homes on the tour were overpriced. Those prices would,for the most part been fine in may 2010 but are too high by 15-25% now. The market is exceptionally volatile and pricing very difficult.

Juvenal Delinquent wrote:

The key all of my life has been to spend it as fast as possible, for it continually loses value over time.

It takes $717 in 2009 to equal the buying power of $100, from when I made my grand entrance, how about you?

Measuring Worth - Purchasing Power of US Dollar

Excellent website.

I have not. Thanks.

Eric wrote:

You should visit The Daily WTF: Curious Perversions in Information Technology, if you don't already.

hiker90 wrote:

And once again my cubicle neighbors know I'm surfing the web. Engineering is not that funny. OK, just simply not funny.

It is when you are doing it wrong.

Rob Dawg wrote:

That would be me. Mrs Dawg and I do the math from time to time. Coupon clipping pays more than $90/hr tax free.

That was the breakthrough for me Rob Dawg, calculating the time spent generating savings in terms of tax free $$/hr. Because you've already paid taxes on the income. People look at me strange when I say a person making $45k a year can live the same lifestyle as someone making $90k a year if they just spend time to buy all the same things at 50% off. But it's true.

Nanoo-Nanoo wrote:

Not everyone is capable or willing to spend the TIME required to do this. Many don't even have the time, many don't have the deductive reasoning skills. Those deductive reasoning skills aren't encouraged. Advertising in particular show the utter contempt.

Time and money are almost entirely interchangeable. You can spend time to create money (working for a wage, researching how to save, finding savings), or conversely you can spend money to create time (fly instead of drive, leverage technology or speciality services). It depends on what you're short more of, which way you want to do it. The people only making $50k a year, they probably see the value in spending time to create more money. The people making $250k a year, might find more value in identifying ways to leverage money to create time. Of course the ideal is to save both time AND money, the twofer!

Bernanke: Shut down banks if they threaten system - Yahoo! News

hiker90 wrote:

Engineering is not that funny. OK, just simply not funny.

Really!? Try putting a 35V electrolytic cap in your neighbor's unpowered line strip and wait for him (not that many her's in engineering) to turn it on....

You should visit The Daily WTF: Curious Perversions in Information Technology, if you don't already.

:addstoFavorites:

Thanks!

Rob Dawg wrote:

That would be me. Mrs Dawg and I do the math from time to time. Coupon clipping pays more than $90/hr tax free.

There aren't that many coupons for generic and store brands. Otherwise, I'd be right there with ya'...

September 2, 2010

Consideration will be given to lifting the grain ban only after information about next year’s grain balance becomes available, Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin said at a government presidium meeting on Sept. 2, Interfax reported.

September 2, 2010

Russian President Dmitri Medvedev has established a commission to quickly respond to changes on food markets, Interfax reported Sept. 2. He said that while it does not need to be permanent, the panel should operate through the year. The commission will coordinate with federal and regional governments, producers and producers’ self-regulating organizations, he said. Russia has sufficient grain, Medvedev said, and an increase in prices is unwarranted. He added that the government will make sure citizens have access to affordable food.

chapel_of_words wrote:

Or arm the sheep. You ever see a wolf approaching a sheep packing a 40cal?

No, I would rather have shepherds. Less chance for mob rule and demagoguery. The same reasons sheep aren't good with money and are targets for wolves, make them more dangerous when armed. Maybe the republic was never more than an ideal in reality, but I'm not ready to abandon it and enter Abaddon yet.

pavel.chichikov wrote on Thu, 9/2/2010 - 8:49 am
September 2, 2010
Consideration will be given to lifting the grain ban only after information about next year’s grain balance becomes available, Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin said at a government presidium meeting on Sept. 2, Interfax reported.

"Plant wheat in the dust, and your bins will bust", as the saying goes...

Vonbek777 wrote:

No, I would rather have shepherds. Less chance for mob rule and demagoguery. The same reasons sheep aren't good with money and are targets for wolves, make them more dangerous when armed.

Well as long as your honest about keeping the people sheep. I assume there's a waiting list for the sheperds? It sounds like an awfully good gig if one can get it.

Nanoo-Nanoo wrote :

Advertising in particular show the utter contempt

Here's a cold-blooded example of that, from today's NYT:

Child’s Ordeal Shows Dangers of Antipsychotic Drugs - NY Times

Even the most reluctant prescribers encounter a marketing juggernaut that has made antipsychotics the nation’s top-selling class of drugs by revenue, $14.6 billion last year, with prominent promotions aimed at treating children. In the waiting room of Kyle’s original child psychiatrist, children played with Legos stamped with the word Risperdal, made by Johnson & Johnson. It has since lost its patent on the drug and stopped handing out the toys.

It is when you are doing it wrong.

And I just saw Cinco's comment. My comments must be a reflection of the looming report deadline. Our thermal/vac test went really well and I'm the lucky one who gets to write the report.

Humans have great variation in intelligence levels and moral behavior. You need people with high intelligence/high morality to protect low intelligence/high morality people from high intelligence/low morality people and to control the low intelligence/low morality people. It sucks, but it's the way we evolved. We need leaders/shepherds/whatever we call them.

Even the most reluctant prescribers encounter a marketing juggernaut that has made antipsychotics the nation’s top-selling class of drugs by revenue, $14.6 billion last year, with prominent promotions aimed at treating children.

If there are any comments to be made, it should be about the item above.

SPOOL wrote:

Dangers of Antipsychotic Drugs - NY Times

It seems like the markets might make use of some of those today....

Ever year we donate a care package of toothbrushes, toothpaste, deodorant, hair care products, band aids, etc to the poor. We get these on sale, clearance, double coupon, etc. We give about $150 worth that typically "costs" us -$10.

Eric wrote:

SPIKE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

How're yer puts?

chapel_of_words wrote:

Well as long as your honest about keeping the people sheep.

I don't keep anyone a sheep. If they can drink from the fountains of critical thinking, they will find a way out. You can 'educate' people how to live better, fuller lives...but all you are doing is reprogramming them...they are still sheep. That is why you have to change the system too. As for being a shepherd... it isn't a gig, it is a calling, used to be tied in with honor, responsibility, duty. You know protect the innocent....and all that jazz...basically being a person instead of a parasite.

Cinco-X wrote:

How're yer puts?

Hating it.

Looks like the Precious took a bat upside the head right about then too.

Yay Pending Home Sales!

Our world is undergoing dramatic changes,it takes a great deal of mental flexibility to discard assumptions that in some cases were valid for generations. Many will do so reluctantly,many more will be unable to do so at all. These are our neighbors,be kind as kind as you can because reality will be plenty cruel enough for all.

Washington Post reporting this morning:
Elizabeth Warren "unexpectedly" cancels scheduled class teachings
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/09/01/AR2010090106733.html

Tom Stone wrote:

These are our neighbors,be kind as kind as you can because reality will be plenty cruel enough for all.

My family is suffering their stupidity. You ask a lot Tom.

Vonbek777 wrote:

As for being a shepherd... it isn't a gig, it is a calling, used to be tied in with honor, responsibility, duty. You know protect the innocent....and all that jazz...basically being a person instead of a parasite.

I'm not sure you understand why shepherds are out there. It's not for the long term health of the sheep. I do agree though on the difference between being a person or a parasite, why I got irked at the article to begin with. So much easier to make everyone think they're doomed, they'll never get ahead etc. than help them understand how they can solve things.

The commission will coordinate with federal and regional governments, producers and producers’ self-regulating organizations, he said. Russia has sufficient grain, Medvedev said, and an increase in prices is unwarranted.

I think this is the planting season for winter wheat. The last report I read said that it is still too dry to plant in some areas although some other previously dry areas have received enough rainfall for planting to proceed. IIRC the winter wheat also has to establish itself ("green up") before winter to protect it from the bitter cold.

chapel_of_words wrote:

I'm not sure you understand why shepherds are out there. It's not for the long term health of the sheep.

Give me a little more credit please. As an absent minded philosopher, I have pondered the state of mankind for many a year. There was a reason the philosopher king was separated from they merchant class by an elite military guard. Models of society always come back to pyramids. But if there is not a buffer class between the capstone and the merchants, that looks out for the base....it all crumbles. City-states by nature are parasitic...the point is you must balance the wealth extracted from the poor and what you give them in return, without killing them. Merchants have always been greedy and short-sighted in their goals...you have to place barriers in their path, else the only truly equitable state of anarchy will prevail.

Vonbek777 wrote:

There was a reason the philosopher king was separated from they merchant class by an elite military guard. Models of society always come back to pyramids. But if there is not a buffer class between the capstone that looks out from the base....it all crumbles. City-states by nature are parasitic...the point is you must balance the wealth extracted from the poor and what you give them in return, without killing them. Merchants have always been greedy and short-sighted in their goals...you have to place barriers in their path, else the only truly equitable state of anarchy will prevail.

Sorry, the allegory of the cave was bout the only worthwhile thing to come out of that dialogue. I'll go back to one of my favorite quotes from a political philosopher I admire:

Many men have imagined republics and principalities that never existed at all. Yet the way men live is so far removed from the way they ought to live that anyone who abandons what is for what should be pursues his downfall rather than his preservation.

Wolves and shephards alike ultimately just view sheep as a food source; their moral context for doing so is entirely irrelevant to the sheep. It's only the shephard who bothers to moralize their predatory aspect into some higher calling, and once having justified it in their own mind, never gives it a second thought. The problem with most philosophical political constructs is they don't account for the introduction of human defects over time, and so lack a built in error-correction system that is robust enough to identify, overcome, and eliminate the defects. Instead they rely on vague promises of "sufficient enlightenment" to get by. Philosopher kings and elite guards are only separated from absolute tyrants and palace guards by, maybe, three generations. Given the span of human history that's a blip on the radar for a measure of success. Our current system is riddled with defects, but it's overcome defects in the past. It remains to be seen over time whether the soft defect-correcting systems (politics) or hard defect-correcting systems (economics) will prove robust enough to fix the defects.

Good retort, but detail me a system that isn't designed to feed off the poor? Entropy rules...my shepherds may be delusional, but they are conditioned to be that way... to serve a purpose...a system of beliefs. The only exception I see is a permanent frontier...low population with plenty of resources gives you glimpse of heaven...but it never lasts, and as history has shown, there are costs associated with it as well.