How's fourth quarter growth and beyond?

Estimates are good, 3% plus, mainly on continued inventory growth. This seems at odds with the decline in brick and mortar stoores which Zero Hedge reports. But the brick and mortars took their losses during the crash, and continued bad news should not be a surose. Oil remains in the $95 range, high enough to make the frackers pofitable. Europe is no worse off than before.  The ten year rate has not gone beyond 3%. So all the conditions for the third year 4.1% remain in place.

What could go wrong?  Taxes come in short for DC causing Congress to lean heavily on the bond market. If that happens, Congress will drive rates up, faster than growth, and the economy will recede.  Look for a clue in the debt limit negotiations, when they become difficult, then we know, Congress cannot pay its bills, and we drop back to a 2.3% rate.

The issue is simple, this is a business cycle and we seem to be at its end, and this is our first time doing it with debt to gdp at nearly 100%.

How did we end the previous cycles? With a bout of inflation as the stock market corrects. Notice in the two previous peaks, inflation surged and held for a time as the market corrected. Can it happen again? CPI is one percent and declining!  What gives? That is the great unknown, but I fear it means a very sharp and sudden correction and a short burst of inflation hits the economy.  We would all wish for a signal, especially the Fed which is about as uncertain as anyone.

So where is inflation going to show up first? Not oil, not with the fracking machine. Its the great mystery, and it may take another quarter of growth before we find our limits. 

It isn't racism killing the Dems and Obama

Obama is simply racist himself, taking the easy way out. But the Republicans are pulling ahead because:

• The national debt is nearly doubled. 
• Poverty is as high as it has ever been in thirty years. 
• Obamacare is slowing the hiring process. 
• And, the racial pandering of the Dems continues.

How big is the illegal economy?

The number point to 8 to 14% of wages are unreported. So, 11% of workers have more money because they break the law.

Rick Newman US News "Data from the IRS shows that total tax receipts from personal income dipped in 2009 and 2010, as would be expected in the aftermath of a tough recession. In 2011, the last year for which data is available, tax receipts rose by about 14 percent, as the economy recovered and more people went back to work. That's a healthy rebound, but some of that may have come, ironically, from government transfer payments, such as extended unemployment insurance, that temporarily boosted some people's income, On the whole, it's hard to tell if tax receipts are depressed as more people underreport their earnings. Economists estimate the size of the underground economy at somewhere between 8 percent and 14 percent of total GPD, which could amount to as much as $2 trillion worth of economic activity. Authorities in California say off-the-books transactions cost the state $6.5 billion in lost tax revenue every year. If the trend is similar throughout the U.S. economy, that would amount to roughly $50 billion in lost tax revenue for all 50 states combined, plus an even bigger chunk that Washington fails to collect. All told, that would be more than enough to completely cover the $85 billion in spending cuts—known as the sequester—that just went into effect. On the other hand, that's a lot of cash consumers end up keeping to spend on cars, appliances, restaurant meals and vacations—almost like a government stimulus program."

Texas, Dallas News:  "This [unreported labor] is so prevalent in the construction industry that researchers at the University of Texas say more than 40 percent of such workers across the state are the victims of payroll fraud. That’s more than 300,000 workers and about $7 billion in wages not reported to the Texas Workforce Commission. This causes the state to miss out on at least $54 million in unemployment insurance each year. The feds lose untold billions in Social Security payments.' 

I say, keep breaking the law.

One Fourth Senator from Texas attempts to count

FORT WORTH — U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz continued his campaign against the national healthcare law Friday, calling on Texans to rise up and join a grassroots movement to try to repeal the program.
This time, he took his argument to a group of local businesspeople, saying it’s time for change.
“How do we repeal Obamacare?” he asked a crowd of nearly 300 people gathered for a Fort Worth Chamber of Commerce luncheon at the Petroleum Club. “It will come from millions and millions of people rising up and saying” that it doesn’t work.

Read more here: http://www.star-telegram.com/2014/01/17/5494696/ted-cruz-calls-on-texans-to-join.html?rh=1#storylink=cpy

Nice try bonehead, but the reason Texas is stuck with Obamacare is because they did not pay attention to democracy. Texas has no voice in DC, its in the numbers. Texas is about six senators short of a fair vote, and until Cruz learns to count Texas is screwed.

Huffington Post readers are illiterate

They can only look at videos and pretty pictures, the result being the site is impossible to view on a tablet.

Obama and poverty

Not so well. Obama has managed to increase poverty, and his increase corresponds to a near doubling of the national debt.  My numbers say that the rise in the national debt is costing the middle class some 1.5% of income per year, enough to cause the rise in poverty.

Proof that Obamacare is harming employment

Coverage Expansion Fail: Less Than One-Third Of Obamacare Exchange Enrollees Were Previously Uninsured

JOLTs in a nutshell.  There are always people entering and leaving the work place. Most of he time a job change requires signing up for health insurance.  Where are the sign ups?

Migration patterns tell us that many more people are unwelcome in New York

Cuomo: New York Governor Andrew Cuomo believes that pro-life activists along with anti-gay activists, and supporters of the Second Amendment, are not welcome in his state.

New York Soon to Trail Florida in Population

Among other things, Cuomo and company screwed us their health system and forced Obamacare on the nation. and your business taxes are stifling.  Now New York is the fourth big state, having dropped from third. Texas has lower unemployment, and Florida is growing at New York's expense.

Does Cuomo need a reason? I give you one, your state was too frigging big and your cirtizens lost out by being under represented in the US Senate.  Your state lives off the DC debt machine with no other real industry. Your state, Cuomo, is fucked. The unemployment rate in New York is 8.9%, on par to become the permanent unemployment state like California. Meanwhile Texas is scooting along with an unemployment of 6.2%.

So, the real answer, Mr. Cuomo, is you will never run for president because you are a fucked up governor.

Who is gong to pay taxes?

Congress survives if they can keep taxes rising fasterer than interest costs. Not with this labor force participation.

When Eric Holder is a racist prick

Bloomberg: President Barack Obama said that racial tensions may have softened his popularity among white voters within the last two years, according to a story posted on the New Yorker magazine’s website today. “There’s no doubt that there’s some folks who just really dislike me because they don’t like the idea of a black president,” Obama said in the article by David Remnick, appearing in the magazine’s Jan. 27 edition.

Eric has one set of rules for his special race and another for the rest of us.