That's not recovery. That's mumbo-jumbo.

Mods: AE allows full reprints with proper accreditation. Proper copyright rules for 2 NYT articles.

http://theautomaticearth.blogspot.com /

Ilargi: When the New York Times starts publishing articles on how bad the financial crisis really is, despite all the green recovery shooting stories sprouting from government circles and media such as, among others, the New York Times, I’m going to have to guess that it's official now.

It sort of makes one wonder how much longer media such as the New York Times will now be able to keep writing and printing articles that contradict what's being published in the New York Times. Or will it be spun as freedom of expression, but not the official point of view of the paper?

Can the editorial staff wash their hands clean of revered writers like Floyd Norris and Bob Herbert? Or should we perhaps look at this from another angle? Is the Times changing its stance on the entire Obama government politics? Is it going to give up the noble art of cheerleading? Is that the sound of a baton dropping?

Herbert’s piece is entitled: "No Recovery in Sight". Some quotes:

* There are now more than five unemployed workers for every job opening in the United States.

* Economists are currently spreading the word that the recession may end sometime this year, but the unemployment rate will continue to climb. That’s not a recovery. That’s mumbo jumbo.

* There were roughly seven million people officially counted as unemployed in November 2007, a month before the recession began. Now there are about 14 million.

* "By May 2009, <..> the total number of underutilized workers had increased dramatically from 15.63 million to 29.37 million — a rise of 13.7 million, or 88 percent. Nearly 30 million working-age individuals were underutilized in May 2009, the largest number in our nation’s history".

* Three-quarters of the workers let go over the past year were permanently displaced, as opposed to temporarily laid off. They won’t be going back to their jobs when economic conditions improve.

* Men accounted for nearly 80 percent of the loss in employment in this recession. <..> Workers under 30 have sustained nearly half the net job losses since November 2007.

* The first step in dealing with a crisis is to recognize that it exists. This is not a problem that will evaporate when the gross domestic product finally begins to creep into positive territory.


Those are serious points, and there's nothing green about them. They're also bordering on a direct attack on everything rosy that Obama and his administration have been claiming lately. They fall about 0.0001% short of painting the president as a liar.

Floyd Norris's "A Recession Measured by New-Home Sales", also in today's edition of the Times, has this:

* There have been bad housing markets before, but never in post-World War II history has the market for new homes suffered as badly as it has in this decline.

* At the peak of the housing boom in 2005, sales of both existing and new homes were running at twice the 1976 rate. This year, the sales rate for existing homes seems to have stabilized at about one-third higher than the 1976 rate. New-home sales also seem to have stabilized, but at about half the 1976 rate.

* ... new-home sales are now running at only about a quarter of peak levels, a fall far deeper than anything seen since the statistics began being collected in the 1960s.

* Of the 135,000 completed but unsold new homes at the end of May, nearly half had been sitting for a year or more. The median age of such homes was 11.5 months, an unprecedented figure.


For those among you who read websites like The Automatic Earth, there is nothing here that wasn't already known and obvious. The same is not true for the average reader of the New York Times. And that, when you come to think of it, is completely insane. After all, why do people read a paper? To find out what's going on, or to see confirmed that la-la land still exists?

These numbers don't suddenly come falling out of the sky in broad daylight. They merely depict an ongoing trend that is worsening fast. That last part is temporarily hidden behind a $13.8 trillion veil, but all that has achieved is for the worsening trendlines not to hit exponential territory. It hasn't stopped the numbers themselves from deteriorating.

And it should be clear that the next $13.8 trillion will be much harder to find. And that it won't be able to stop the deterioration either. It will at best halt the plunge in mid-air for another painfully expensive fleeting moment in time.

People have a right to know what's truly going on in their societies, rather than fall prey to the interests of politicians and financiers that are better served by hiding what's real. The situation is about to get a whole lot worse, and people deserve the right to make preparations for that as best they see fit.

The ongoing refusal to inform them of what's real and what is not, perpetrated by governments, media and industry, is a disgrace. It's not how a civilized society treats its citizens. Perhaps the New York Times today put a first step on the path to doing what needs to be done. Not that I'm not sceptical about it.

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http://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/27/opinion/27herbert.htm...

Op-Ed Columnist
No Recovery in Sight



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By BOB HERBERT
Published: June 26, 2009

How do you put together a consumer economy that works when the consumers are out of work?
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Bob Herbert
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Times Topics: Credit Crisis — The Essentials


One of the great stories you’ll be hearing over the next couple of years will be about the large number of Americans who were forced out of work in this recession and remained unable to find gainful employment after the recession ended. We’re basically in denial about this.

There are now more than five unemployed workers for every job opening in the United States. The ranks of the poor are growing, welfare rolls are rising and young American men on a broad front are falling into an abyss of joblessness.

Some months ago, the Obama administration and various mainstream economists forecast a peak unemployment rate of roughly 8 percent this year. It has already reached 9.4 percent, and most analysts now expect it to hit 10 percent or higher. Economists are currently spreading the word that the recession may end sometime this year, but the unemployment rate will continue to climb. That’s not a recovery. That’s mumbo jumbo.

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http://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/27/business/economy/27ch...

Off the Charts
A Recession Measured by New-Home Sales



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By FLOYD NORRIS
Published: June 26, 2009

There have been bad housing markets before, but never in post-World War II history has the market for new homes suffered as badly as it has in this decline.


That plunge raises questions about whether some homes built during the boom will ever be sold. It could also suggest that home builders have been slow to cut their prices enough to keep up with falling market prices.

For more than three decades, the sales volume of existing single-family homes and newly built houses tended to rise and fall by about the same percentage, as can be seen in the accompanying charts. To be sure, sales of new homes did tend to do a little worse during recessions, but the difference was small and short-lived.

hopefully one where the money goes into the public sector rather than the private.

we can only hope that Obama's compromises on the first stimulus package haven't poisoned the well for a 2nd one.

Bailouts and bonuses for parasites accomplish nothing. The economy can't come back until people have real money to spend.

Start watching crime statistics increase, as the first couple of waves of unemployed start running out of unemployment benefits. People don't tend to be idle when their families are hungry.

food pantries are already stretched thin, no way will they be able to provide food to feed those millions of hungry families.

it sure was during 8 years of The Youngster- which saw Fraud redressed as Virtue. The entire ed. board needs to do the 'air dance' someday...let's make that day a holiday and have a goddam party