Thanks for the link to an article that actually breaks the data out.
The bubble markets actually out performed my expectations. Q1 2006 pretty much coincided with the froth point, that values in Phoenix only went down 5.5% and in Las Vegas 9.4% suggests that the window for market entrants to be seriously upside down was fairly limited in time. I suspect there is some pain hidden in the 0.6% gain in Los Angeles-Riverside, there have been some horror stories coming out of the Inland Empire.
I still ask whether you get meaningful data out of aggregating numbers nationally when the underlying regions from positive 11.1 to negative 22.6. I am not sure what a national -1.4% number really signals in the context of that wide range of results.
The only drawback to the survey is that houses sold with government loans don't count. Houses bought by families who turn to loans insured by the Federal Housing Administration or guaranteed by the Department of Veterans Affairs tend to be priced lower than those sold with conventional loans, so the finance board's prices skew somewhat higher than those in other surveys.
So while it expands its survey population on the upper end of the price scale (>$417k) it doesn't survey the mostly lower end FHA & VA pool.
In 'anti-bubble' zones where prices are very low this probably skews the results as much as excluding all the >$417K homes freddy/fannie ineligibles does in bubble zones.
Still pretty interesting. What do you make of it CR? Are the bubble zones immune?
Case-Shiller index, which has a similar methodology to OFHEO but with less drawbacks (no problems with the confirming limit), turned negative YoY for January 2007 and the drops deepened in February. The March index should also be published next week. It does not cover all the markets, though.
collected from Co, Az, NV, and Ca. missing UT, WY, MO, OR and WA but so far I can not understand how with Ca. -12.7% the avg for the west (according to NAR) is -1.7%.
At the most there are postive of +2% in few markets while in others there is -15% and -5%. Ca. is ahugh market and it alone should pull the west avg toward -12.7% ......
Oh, I've got to quietly mention that these surveys are useless for figuring out what is actually going on in any single market.
They might provide an overall meaningful indication, but I don't see how.
Either the old old or new Housing Trackers will give you a better idea of what is actually happening. The change in sold and sampled mixes can be acutely misleading.
Case-Shiller is good but too small and it lags market conditions. MLS data is good because you can sample both listing and sold prices. In an information age, the OFHEO and FHFB info is stone-axe stuff.
PS: For an indication of how badly skewed that data can be, here are the Housing Tracker (list prices) for Miami-Fort Lauderdale
25th percentile:
4/2/06 $259,000; 4/2/07 $230,00
In the short run the OFHEO index understates the magnitude of price fluctuations. It is useless for market timing analysis, but good for comparing price levels over the decades.
"Included in our loans held for investment portfolio at December 31, 2006 were $1.2 billion in pay option ARM loans, or 18% of the portfolio, as compared to $1.3 billion, or 25% of the portfolio, at December 31, 2005. As of December 31, 2006, approximately 83% (based on loan count) of our pay option ARM loans had negatively amortized, resulting in an increase of $26.8 million to their original loan balance. This is an increase from 56% at December 31, 2005. The net increase in unpaid principal balance due to negative amortization was $21.4 million for the year ended December 31, 2006, which approximated the deferred interest recognized for the year. The original weighted average combined loan-to-value (CLTV) on our pay option ARM loans was 76%, while the estimated current LTV at December 31, 2006 is 64%, calculated based on the Office of the Federal Housing Enterprise Oversight House Price Index Metropolitan Statistical Areas data on a loan level basis. The decline in the current loan-to-value was due to estimated appreciation of the underlying property value. The original weighted average FICO score on our pay option ARM loans was 708 at December 31, 2006."
Index, shmindex. There are properties all over the country that have sold recently - or worse, aren't selling - at prices well below the previous sale in 2005. Or the price for an identical unit.
So just where are properties actually selling today for more than the sale price in 2005? Manhatten, SF, Seattle just maybe?
IT is the newest economic statistics that usually get all the attention as investors and analysts try to gauge the health of the economy. But sometimes the statistics that take the longest to arrive can provide the most important information, particularly when they point to inflection points in the economy.
So it may be with jobs data that the Bureau of Labor Statistics released this month for the third quarter of 2006. The new data calls into question the previous conclusion that employment grew at a strong rate in late 2006.
And it indicates that many small businesses, which had been leading the way in job creation, are now suffering. As is shown in the accompanying graphic, companies with fewer than 50 employees lost workers in the quarter, while larger ones kept hiring, albeit at a reduced pace.
It also appears that 8,000 more businesses closed than opened in that quarter, making it the worst quarter by that measure since the third quarter of 2001, when an economy already in recession was jolted by the Sept. 11 attacks.
The data is included in a quarterly report, titled Business Employment Dynamics, that comes from reviewing employment at every company in the United States that is subject to state unemployment compensation laws. By that measure, private-sector employment rose by just 19,000 jobs in the quarter.
The widely reported data from the bureaus monthly survey of employers concluded that the quarter had a net gain in private-sector jobs of 498,000. That led economists to conclude that employment growth was holding up well even though the overall economy had slowed, growing at just a 2 percent annual rate.
A big difference was in construction employment, which the quarterly study found contracted by 77,000 jobs in the quarter, in contrast to the increase of 34,000 jobs shown by the monthly surveys.
The data show we had two consecutive quarters of job losses in construction, said David Talan, an economist at the bureau, noting the small decrease shown in the second quarter of last year...
One reason the monthly survey can be inaccurate is that it has to estimate the number of jobs created by new businesses, which are by definition not included in the survey. It may be that those estimates were too high.
It will not be until next February that the monthly numbers are revised in the next benchmark revision. We may learn then that the job market was not as strong as it seemed to be in late 2006 and early 2007.
On the one hand, this confirms my feeling that the economy has been much worse than indicated by "conventional wisdom". On the other, it makes me wonder how corporate profits have held up so well. Whatever the answer, it seems to be that profits and stock prices are living on borrowed time, as the economy has continued to stagnate. There was a boost from the huge drop in oil prices a
On the one hand, this confirms my feeling that the economy has been much worse than indicated by "conventional wisdom". On the other, it makes me wonder how corporate profits have held up so well. Whatever the answer, it seems to be that profits and stock prices are living on borrowed time, as the economy has continued to stagnate. There was a boost from the huge drop in oil prices around the time of the election. Obviously, that has been reversed. Meanwhile, the economy continues to stagnate led by the housing collapse for which no end is in sight.
How many feel that the U.S. is on the wrong track? The answer is > 70% I believe. We are back where we were around 1980. Reagan's shining vision has been replaced by Bush's befuddled, Magoo vision...
Reagan's shining vision has been replaced by Bush's befuddled, Magoo vision...
Reagan's shining vision was Bush's USA. Who put the Bush family in the White House anyway?
Saying that Bush betrayed Reagan is like saying Stalin betrayed Lenin. It was the latter who was responsible for the former coming to power.
The trends that are now bringing the US to grief - not the least the reliance on borrowing instead of production and anti-intellectualism - started under Reagan. Oh yeah, he appointed Alan Greenspan, too.
the quality of earnings has deteriorated dramtically, this will only be brought to light when the stats turn decidedly down and it is clear that the domestic economy is in recession.
Americans are very hypocritical, they do not care about the underlying fundamentals, the fraud, the leverage, and risk as long as their interests are being served by a rising marketplace.
They do not care that corporate America and the jobs are literally being looted by PE & LBO's cause near-term the stock prices are rising. The end-game though is clear, much weaker corporations with dramatically rising debt service, coupled with little choice but to cut costs and excerbate the inevitable downturn.
Once the recession is upon us, look for every moron that attempted to profit off of the looting to stand up, point fingers, and claim they did not realize what was taking place.
This time in history is one of our worst and is filled with greed with no regard for what lies ahead.
Unfortunate that our children will be left with the monumental task of picking up the pieces left by the self-serving nature of our generation.
The trends that are now bringing the US to grief - not the least the reliance on borrowing instead of production and anti-intellectualism - started under Reagan. Oh yeah, he appointed Alan Greenspan, too.
Warning: OT Unfortunate that our children will be left with the monumental task of picking up the pieces left by the self-serving nature of our generation.
risk capital
Careful, there, rc. I said the same thing a year ago, and got badly chewed out from the self-righteous boomer faction who apparently felt annoyed at my lumping the whole group together.
I have gone through this range of feelings towards the boomers: admiration, awe, extreme support, envy, can-you-boomers-ever-get-to-where-your-kids-are-valuable-as-well?!!?!?, to outright disgust, and finally total-ass lack of respect.
And the boomers are the ones who desperately want to believe that the world will end in 2012, that way they don't have to address the reality that the world really isn't just here for them (that the polluting doesn't matter, and their self-preoccupation will have been fated as they were the pinnacle). So they can avoid the reality that their irresponsibility will, indeed, have long-ranging ramifications. And actually, their legacy is what the future will judge and value them by. The facts are that their greed and self-inflated valuations may be their biggest legacy of all. One which future generations will have to study to prevent from ever occurring again in future societies.
Sorry, but that is what we'll be left with if they don't start making amends by doing everything possible to change this global disaster (environmental, financial...hey, pick your poison, you've left us many).
And the damned San Fran Chronicle this last week had a series celebrating the f-ing hippies 40 year aniversary. Yeah, guys, the acid's great, but didn't you actually LEARN anything?
And the greatest free hippie concert in Golden Gate park is being sponsered by.....wait for it....an investment banker!! You got it. Great fun, the aging and neo-hippies all hanging out stoned with the bluegrass crowd. Almost like the Be-in, hey, guys? AN INVESTMENT BANKER!!! Hey, I think he's just grand to be so generous. But something tells me the crowd just isn't quite getting this whole thing.
I just don't see the boomer generation as having done anything good in America. They inherited a booming unionized labor foundation and let it completely get destroyed. All in favor of their burgeoning 401k account. They inherited an incredible art and music scene, with racial crossover in jazz and even beginning in opera. The folk scene that created Dylan is pre-boomer, btw. All that has become rap-for-profit, crap pop-for-profit only. Crap jazz-for-profit-only. American art has collapsed since Warhol surfaced (who was, btw, pre-boomer).
And you can't take credit for civil rights changes, either, because MLK was not a boomer. And you didn't want Malcolm. And, by the way, the development of computing was well underway before the boomers got to the field. You can try but you don't deserve credit for that, either. The biggest cultural lega
dotcommunist - Nice rant. I do find I get along better with the parents of the Boomers (ie, the depression generation) than I ever have with the Boom generation themselves. The generation that went through real economic turmoil usually has a better grasp on current realities than their kids.
Bruce Webb said: "...I still ask whether you get meaningful data out of aggregating numbers nationally when the underlying regions from positive 11.1 to negative 22.6. I am not sure what a national -1.4% number really signals in the context of that wide range of results."
It's not meaningful. In a real economic recession with the accompanying broad-based weakness in employment the range wouldn't be like that and there would be more areas in the "negative."
Unfortunately, I think we'll have to experience a real recession before anyone believes me on this.
On the other, it makes me wonder how corporate profits have held up so well.
Well maybe they used the latest financial instrument, an equivalent of CREDIT SWAP. Its called PROFIT SWAP xD i should patent it right now
I just don't see the boomer generation as having done anything good in America. They inherited a booming unionized labor foundation and let it completely get destroyed. All in favor of their burgeoning 401k account. They inherited an incredible art and music scene, with racial crossover in jazz and even beginning in opera. The folk scene that created Dylan is pre-boomer, btw. All that has become rap-for-profit, crap pop-for-profit only. Crap jazz-for-profit-only. American art has collapsed since Warhol surfaced (who was, btw, pre-boomer).
And you can't take credit for civil rights changes, either, because MLK was not a boomer. And you didn't want Malcolm. And, by the way, the development of computing was well underway before the boomers got to the field. You can try but you don't deserve credit for that, either. The biggest cultural lega... blah, blah, blah.
Get a life dotcomm...
Yes I'm a boomer - full card carrying member and 'yes' some of that is accurate and 'no' some of it isn't...
But it so pathetically reminiscent of the same whining I heard from boomers about the 'greatest generation' around the time the phrase 'never trust anyone over thirty' was coined.
People are people and not much changes... if you are lucky you get to ride around the star called 'Sun' about 70 time as and then you die. meanwhile individually you've probably left little to show for it either 'positive or 'negative'.
Nothing really changes... the younger generation pushes the older ones out of the way as it should be... rinse repeat.
BTW - I have teenagers now, you should hear them rant about Gen Xers as being worthless... where have I heard that before?
nice rant. What I will say is that I see a lot of things that the average person does not, there are many instances where I am not proud of my generation and what they stand for.
The what can I take from someone else to line my own pockets mentality. For example, PE and LBO deals, in the end, these groups will strip every last dollar from the employees and flip it back to the misinformed public. Do we stand and and say, "ENOUGH", no, we sit by and watch it happen, because the DOW is up, we don't give a shit. Healthcare, retirement benefits, and wages will suffer for these assholes near-term gain.
The problem, primary as I see it is the "what's in it for me" attitude, if there is something that will allow the individual to benefit, it seems they will look the other way. Even if someone happens to be on the other side of the transaction that may be harmed. Rule number one, "Do no harm". Unfortunately, this rule is not practiced or is ignored.
Many ignore the implications of a transaction due to the near-term payday, knowing full well that the deal is shit or that it will be shit, but, absolutely do not care due to the potential payoff.
Sad really. It is also said that there are certain individuals that trust, thus are easy prey due to their lack of knowledge and inability to see through the shit-barrel being served up.
Greed is responsible for most of the problems we have today, the lack of concern for those on the other side of a transaction.
Ask yourself a question, have you always done what is best? Or have you done what is easy?
It is difficult, it is less profitable in most cases to do the right thing, but unfortunately, today it is the norm to take the easy way out preying on those who trust and are less educated/less informed.
So, am I pissed, yes, I am pissed, I am embarrassed that we allow this garbage to take place on our watch, that our regulators and politicians ignore the blatant truth, and that this administration os likely to be proven to be one of, if not the most harmful to future generations in our history.
So, am I pissed, yes, I am pissed, I am embarrassed that we allow this garbage to take place on our watch, that our regulators and politicians ignore the blatant truth, and that this administration os likely to be proven to be one of, if not the most harmful to future generations in our history.
I'm not proud of boomers or disappointed by them - they (we) are just people like those that came before and those that will come after.
People are people - not much changes generation to generation. Situations change, people not so much.
As as for the 'greatest generation'... my father (one of them) used to just cringe when he heard that term - he'd tell me over and over right up until his death last year that the guy who coined that phrase couldn't have sat in the same business meetings he sat in all through the 50s, 60s and 70s.
And he wasn't down playing WWII or the depression... just that faced with that situation they did what they had too do, the only choice, and muddled through... If they had been faced with 'challenges of prosperity'... he was convinced they wouldn't have fared any better than the current generations... because we can defer the hard choices we do... just like the 20s... By the 30s & 40s no choices were left.
He would also add - we and or our children will likely get an opportunity to face the kinds of hardships they saw or worse... it returns from time to time and as more debt piles up & the environment more constrained... choices narrow.
From OFHEO it slowly digresses into generations...interesting.
As a Generation X'er, we'll take credit for the Internet Unfortunately, we'll also take credit for reality TV, and the degradation of America in general.
Case-Shiller is the best we're going to get in terms of accuracy. It's released the last Tuesday of every month at 9AM EST, meaning tomorrow morning. It's safe to predict they will show home prices down about 2% in their 10-city index, and 1.5% in their 20-city index (Due to positive numbers in Seattle, Portland, Charlotte).
Case-Shiller does not include new home sales or condos, they only include sale price comparisons of the same house.
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First??
What a dramtic decline on that graph!!
Thanks for the link to an article that actually breaks the data out.
The bubble markets actually out performed my expectations. Q1 2006 pretty much coincided with the froth point, that values in Phoenix only went down 5.5% and in Las Vegas 9.4% suggests that the window for market entrants to be seriously upside down was fairly limited in time. I suspect there is some pain hidden in the 0.6% gain in Los Angeles-Riverside, there have been some horror stories coming out of the Inland Empire.
I still ask whether you get meaningful data out of aggregating numbers nationally when the underlying regions from positive 11.1 to negative 22.6. I am not sure what a national -1.4% number really signals in the context of that wide range of results.
Bruce,
According to national averages, everyone has about 1 breast.
True mathmatically whilst irrelevant in realty.
Another flaw...
The only drawback to the survey is that houses sold with government loans don't count. Houses bought by families who turn to loans insured by the Federal Housing Administration or guaranteed by the Department of Veterans Affairs tend to be priced lower than those sold with conventional loans, so the finance board's prices skew somewhat higher than those in other surveys.
So while it expands its survey population on the upper end of the price scale (>$417k) it doesn't survey the mostly lower end FHA & VA pool.
In 'anti-bubble' zones where prices are very low this probably skews the results as much as excluding all the >$417K homes freddy/fannie ineligibles does in bubble zones.
Still pretty interesting. What do you make of it CR? Are the bubble zones immune?
Case-Shiller index
, which has a similar methodology to OFHEO but with less drawbacks (no problems with the confirming limit), turned negative YoY for January 2007 and the drops deepened in February. The March index should also be published next week. It does not cover all the markets, though.
http://thumbsnap.com/v/b02hBtjf.jpg
This looks like a another job for Super Prime!
http://thumbsnap.com/%76/aq8Q3pPV.jpg
(sorry, no preview because thumbsnap still has their autocropping thumb up their ...)
Classic bubble. Stockmarket skyrockets in face of unprecedented declines in key segments of the economy...
more and more stats show we hit bottom.
I jjust doubt the stats.
collected from Co, Az, NV, and Ca. missing UT, WY, MO, OR and WA but so far I can not understand how with Ca. -12.7% the avg for the west (according to NAR) is -1.7%.
At the most there are postive of +2% in few markets while in others there is -15% and -5%. Ca. is ahugh market and it alone should pull the west avg toward -12.7% ......
Oh, I've got to quietly mention that these surveys are useless for figuring out what is actually going on in any single market.
They might provide an overall meaningful indication, but I don't see how.
Either the old old or new
Housing Trackers will give you a better idea of what is actually happening. The change in sold and sampled mixes can be acutely misleading.
Case-Shiller is good but too small and it lags market conditions. MLS data is good because you can sample both listing and sold prices. In an information age, the OFHEO and FHFB info is stone-axe stuff.
PS: For an indication of how badly skewed that data can be, here are the Housing Tracker (list prices) for Miami-Fort Lauderdale
25th percentile:
4/2/06 $259,000; 4/2/07 $230,00
50th percentile:
4/2/06 $$379,966; 4/2/07 $345,000
75th percentile:
4/2/06 $599,000; 4/2/07 $539,900
Prices have been dropping there since mid '05. The average 75th percentile home has lost at least $150,000 in value.
Yal,
take a step back and remember the arm reset chart that CR and Tanta threw up, this thing ain't bottoming til mid to late 08 at the earliest.
The media is noise at best and unbelievably misinformed.
In the short run the OFHEO index understates the magnitude of price fluctuations. It is useless for market timing analysis, but good for comparing price levels over the decades.
Check out Indymac's annual report (10-K):
"Included in our loans held for investment portfolio at December 31, 2006 were $1.2 billion in pay option ARM loans, or 18% of the portfolio, as compared to $1.3 billion, or 25% of the portfolio, at December 31, 2005. As of December 31, 2006, approximately 83% (based on loan count) of our pay option ARM loans had negatively amortized, resulting in an increase of $26.8 million to their original loan balance. This is an increase from 56% at December 31, 2005. The net increase in unpaid principal balance due to negative amortization was $21.4 million for the year ended December 31, 2006, which approximated the deferred interest recognized for the year. The original weighted average combined loan-to-value (CLTV) on our pay option ARM loans was 76%, while the estimated current LTV at December 31, 2006 is 64%, calculated based on the Office of the Federal Housing Enterprise Oversight House Price Index Metropolitan Statistical Areas data on a loan level basis. The decline in the current loan-to-value was due to estimated appreciation of the underlying property value. The original weighted average FICO score on our pay option ARM loans was 708 at December 31, 2006."
Index, shmindex. There are properties all over the country that have sold recently - or worse, aren't selling - at prices well below the previous sale in 2005. Or the price for an identical unit.
So just where are properties actually selling today for more than the sale price in 2005? Manhatten, SF, Seattle just maybe?
From the NY Times Saturday:
IT is the newest economic statistics that usually get all the attention as investors and analysts try to gauge the health of the economy. But sometimes the statistics that take the longest to arrive can provide the most important information, particularly when they point to inflection points in the economy.
So it may be with jobs data that the Bureau of Labor Statistics released this month for the third quarter of 2006. The new data calls into question the previous conclusion that employment grew at a strong rate in late 2006.
And it indicates that many small businesses, which had been leading the way in job creation, are now suffering. As is shown in the accompanying graphic, companies with fewer than 50 employees lost workers in the quarter, while larger ones kept hiring, albeit at a reduced pace.
It also appears that 8,000 more businesses closed than opened in that quarter, making it the worst quarter by that measure since the third quarter of 2001, when an economy already in recession was jolted by the Sept. 11 attacks.
The data is included in a quarterly report, titled Business Employment Dynamics, that comes from reviewing employment at every company in the United States that is subject to state unemployment compensation laws. By that measure, private-sector employment rose by just 19,000 jobs in the quarter.
The widely reported data from the bureaus monthly survey of employers concluded that the quarter had a net gain in private-sector jobs of 498,000. That led economists to conclude that employment growth was holding up well even though the overall economy had slowed, growing at just a 2 percent annual rate.
A big difference was in construction employment, which the quarterly study found contracted by 77,000 jobs in the quarter, in contrast to the increase of 34,000 jobs shown by the monthly surveys.
The data show we had two consecutive quarters of job losses in construction, said David Talan, an economist at the bureau, noting the small decrease shown in the second quarter of last year...
One reason the monthly survey can be inaccurate is that it has to estimate the number of jobs created by new businesses, which are by definition not included in the survey. It may be that those estimates were too high.
It will not be until next February that the monthly numbers are revised in the next benchmark revision. We may learn then that the job market was not as strong as it seemed to be in late 2006 and early 2007.
On the one hand, this confirms my feeling that the economy has been much worse than indicated by "conventional wisdom". On the other, it makes me wonder how corporate profits have held up so well. Whatever the answer, it seems to be that profits and stock prices are living on borrowed time, as the economy has continued to stagnate. There was a boost from the huge drop in oil prices a
The following was truncated by HaloScan...
On the one hand, this confirms my feeling that the economy has been much worse than indicated by "conventional wisdom". On the other, it makes me wonder how corporate profits have held up so well. Whatever the answer, it seems to be that profits and stock prices are living on borrowed time, as the economy has continued to stagnate. There was a boost from the huge drop in oil prices around the time of the election. Obviously, that has been reversed. Meanwhile, the economy continues to stagnate led by the housing collapse for which no end is in sight.
How many feel that the U.S. is on the wrong track? The answer is > 70% I believe. We are back where we were around 1980. Reagan's shining vision has been replaced by Bush's befuddled, Magoo vision...
Mister Magoo was a cartoon character who was near-sighted and didn't see all the damage he was causing...
Dang! Them new fangled home loans!
YouTube - Housing Bust Recovery in 1930s
Reagan's shining vision has been replaced by Bush's befuddled, Magoo vision...
Reagan's shining vision was Bush's USA. Who put the Bush family in the White House anyway?
Saying that Bush betrayed Reagan is like saying Stalin betrayed Lenin. It was the latter who was responsible for the former coming to power.
The trends that are now bringing the US to grief - not the least the reliance on borrowing instead of production and anti-intellectualism - started under Reagan. Oh yeah, he appointed Alan Greenspan, too.
Don't cry for Reagan
In short, the monthly numbers released by the BLS are absolutely USELESS? Is that it?
We are doomed.
Investor confidence in BLS may take a big hit if numbers for the whole year are revised down significantly.
Dan,
the quality of earnings has deteriorated dramtically, this will only be brought to light when the stats turn decidedly down and it is clear that the domestic economy is in recession.
Americans are very hypocritical, they do not care about the underlying fundamentals, the fraud, the leverage, and risk as long as their interests are being served by a rising marketplace.
They do not care that corporate America and the jobs are literally being looted by PE & LBO's cause near-term the stock prices are rising. The end-game though is clear, much weaker corporations with dramatically rising debt service, coupled with little choice but to cut costs and excerbate the inevitable downturn.
Once the recession is upon us, look for every moron that attempted to profit off of the looting to stand up, point fingers, and claim they did not realize what was taking place.
This time in history is one of our worst and is filled with greed with no regard for what lies ahead.
Unfortunate that our children will be left with the monumental task of picking up the pieces left by the self-serving nature of our generation.
May 25, 2007 How the Government Creates Jobs Richard Benson 321gold . . . Inc
Risk capital,
I just think that the last 7 years have open my eyes to the ill effects of secular capitalism.
The trends that are now bringing the US to grief - not the least the reliance on borrowing instead of production and anti-intellectualism - started under Reagan. Oh yeah, he appointed Alan Greenspan, too.
And here's a graph of Saint Ronnie's borrowing: U.S. National Debt Graph: Since Great Depression
And here's the federal debt by president: Presidents and the Federal Debt
Warning: OT
Unfortunate that our children will be left with the monumental task of picking up the pieces left by the self-serving nature of our generation.
risk capital
Careful, there, rc. I said the same thing a year ago, and got badly chewed out from the self-righteous boomer faction who apparently felt annoyed at my lumping the whole group together.
I have gone through this range of feelings towards the boomers: admiration, awe, extreme support, envy, can-you-boomers-ever-get-to-where-your-kids-are-valuable-as-well?!!?!?, to outright disgust, and finally total-ass lack of respect.
And the boomers are the ones who desperately want to believe that the world will end in 2012, that way they don't have to address the reality that the world really isn't just here for them (that the polluting doesn't matter, and their self-preoccupation will have been fated as they were the pinnacle). So they can avoid the reality that their irresponsibility will, indeed, have long-ranging ramifications. And actually, their legacy is what the future will judge and value them by. The facts are that their greed and self-inflated valuations may be their biggest legacy of all. One which future generations will have to study to prevent from ever occurring again in future societies.
Sorry, but that is what we'll be left with if they don't start making amends by doing everything possible to change this global disaster (environmental, financial...hey, pick your poison, you've left us many).
And the damned San Fran Chronicle this last week had a series celebrating the f-ing hippies 40 year aniversary. Yeah, guys, the acid's great, but didn't you actually LEARN anything?
And the greatest free hippie concert in Golden Gate park is being sponsered by.....wait for it....an investment banker!! You got it. Great fun, the aging and neo-hippies all hanging out stoned with the bluegrass crowd. Almost like the Be-in, hey, guys? AN INVESTMENT BANKER!!! Hey, I think he's just grand to be so generous. But something tells me the crowd just isn't quite getting this whole thing.
I just don't see the boomer generation as having done anything good in America. They inherited a booming unionized labor foundation and let it completely get destroyed. All in favor of their burgeoning 401k account. They inherited an incredible art and music scene, with racial crossover in jazz and even beginning in opera. The folk scene that created Dylan is pre-boomer, btw. All that has become rap-for-profit, crap pop-for-profit only. Crap jazz-for-profit-only. American art has collapsed since Warhol surfaced (who was, btw, pre-boomer).
And you can't take credit for civil rights changes, either, because MLK was not a boomer. And you didn't want Malcolm. And, by the way, the development of computing was well underway before the boomers got to the field. You can try but you don't deserve credit for that, either. The biggest cultural lega
The biggest cultural legacy you did was develop the sports market and the stock market. (Hedge funds, the options exchange and offshoring)
You guys inherited the greatest set-up in history, and what exactly have you done with it?
Sorry to rant, rc, but I do hope you have a better response. Considering you have capital (and not communist) in your name, you just might.
dotcommunist - Nice rant. I do find I get along better with the parents of the Boomers (ie, the depression generation) than I ever have with the Boom generation themselves. The generation that went through real economic turmoil usually has a better grasp on current realities than their kids.
Bruce Webb said: "...I still ask whether you get meaningful data out of aggregating numbers nationally when the underlying regions from positive 11.1 to negative 22.6. I am not sure what a national -1.4% number really signals in the context of that wide range of results."
It's not meaningful. In a real economic recession with the accompanying broad-based weakness in employment the range wouldn't be like that and there would be more areas in the "negative."
Unfortunately, I think we'll have to experience a real recession before anyone believes me on this.
Sebastia
On the other, it makes me wonder how corporate profits have held up so well.
Well maybe they used the latest financial instrument, an equivalent of CREDIT SWAP. Its called PROFIT SWAP xD i should patent it right now
I just don't see the boomer generation as having done anything good in America. They inherited a booming unionized labor foundation and let it completely get destroyed. All in favor of their burgeoning 401k account. They inherited an incredible art and music scene, with racial crossover in jazz and even beginning in opera. The folk scene that created Dylan is pre-boomer, btw. All that has become rap-for-profit, crap pop-for-profit only. Crap jazz-for-profit-only. American art has collapsed since Warhol surfaced (who was, btw, pre-boomer).
And you can't take credit for civil rights changes, either, because MLK was not a boomer. And you didn't want Malcolm. And, by the way, the development of computing was well underway before the boomers got to the field. You can try but you don't deserve credit for that, either. The biggest cultural lega... blah, blah, blah.
Get a life dotcomm...
Yes I'm a boomer - full card carrying member and 'yes' some of that is accurate and 'no' some of it isn't...
But it so pathetically reminiscent of the same whining I heard from boomers about the 'greatest generation' around the time the phrase 'never trust anyone over thirty' was coined.
People are people and not much changes... if you are lucky you get to ride around the star called 'Sun' about 70 time as and then you die. meanwhile individually you've probably left little to show for it either 'positive or 'negative'.
Nothing really changes... the younger generation pushes the older ones out of the way as it should be... rinse repeat.
BTW - I have teenagers now, you should hear them rant about Gen Xers as being worthless... where have I heard that before?
Plus ça change, plus cest la même chose...
dotcom,
nice rant. What I will say is that I see a lot of things that the average person does not, there are many instances where I am not proud of my generation and what they stand for.
The what can I take from someone else to line my own pockets mentality. For example, PE and LBO deals, in the end, these groups will strip every last dollar from the employees and flip it back to the misinformed public. Do we stand and and say, "ENOUGH", no, we sit by and watch it happen, because the DOW is up, we don't give a shit. Healthcare, retirement benefits, and wages will suffer for these assholes near-term gain.
The problem, primary as I see it is the "what's in it for me" attitude, if there is something that will allow the individual to benefit, it seems they will look the other way. Even if someone happens to be on the other side of the transaction that may be harmed. Rule number one, "Do no harm". Unfortunately, this rule is not practiced or is ignored.
Many ignore the implications of a transaction due to the near-term payday, knowing full well that the deal is shit or that it will be shit, but, absolutely do not care due to the potential payoff.
Sad really. It is also said that there are certain individuals that trust, thus are easy prey due to their lack of knowledge and inability to see through the shit-barrel being served up.
Greed is responsible for most of the problems we have today, the lack of concern for those on the other side of a transaction.
Ask yourself a question, have you always done what is best? Or have you done what is easy?
It is difficult, it is less profitable in most cases to do the right thing, but unfortunately, today it is the norm to take the easy way out preying on those who trust and are less educated/less informed.
So, am I pissed, yes, I am pissed, I am embarrassed that we allow this garbage to take place on our watch, that our regulators and politicians ignore the blatant truth, and that this administration os likely to be proven to be one of, if not the most harmful to future generations in our history.
So, am I pissed, yes, I am pissed, I am embarrassed that we allow this garbage to take place on our watch, that our regulators and politicians ignore the blatant truth, and that this administration os likely to be proven to be one of, if not the most harmful to future generations in our history.
I'm not proud of boomers or disappointed by them - they (we) are just people like those that came before and those that will come after.
People are people - not much changes generation to generation. Situations change, people not so much.
As as for the 'greatest generation'... my father (one of them) used to just cringe when he heard that term - he'd tell me over and over right up until his death last year that the guy who coined that phrase couldn't have sat in the same business meetings he sat in all through the 50s, 60s and 70s.
And he wasn't down playing WWII or the depression... just that faced with that situation they did what they had too do, the only choice, and muddled through... If they had been faced with 'challenges of prosperity'... he was convinced they wouldn't have fared any better than the current generations... because we can defer the hard choices we do... just like the 20s... By the 30s & 40s no choices were left.
He would also add - we and or our children will likely get an opportunity to face the kinds of hardships they saw or worse... it returns from time to time and as more debt piles up & the environment more constrained... choices narrow.
Meanwhile we continue to speed around the sun.
Anonymous | 05.28.07 - 4:27 pm | # = me
Halo, more than likely written by one of my boomer peers.
From OFHEO it slowly digresses into generations...interesting.
As a Generation X'er, we'll take credit for the Internet
Unfortunately, we'll also take credit for reality TV, and the degradation of America in general.
Case-Shiller is the best we're going to get in terms of accuracy. It's released the last Tuesday of every month at 9AM EST, meaning tomorrow morning. It's safe to predict they will show home prices down about 2% in their 10-city index, and 1.5% in their 20-city index (Due to positive numbers in Seattle, Portland, Charlotte).
Case-Shiller does not include new home sales or condos, they only include sale price comparisons of the same house.
Also, remember Case-Shiller releases are two months delayed, meaning tomorrow's data is for March.
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