Brent Nyitray
Fairlington Blade
Let the mutherfuker burn!
jnc4p
Kevin S. Willis
Michigoose
lmsinca
markinaustin
Arcanaut
novahockey
quarterback
ScottC
yellojktVital Statistics:
| Last | Change | Percent | |
| S&P Futures | 1317.8 | 2.1 | 0.16% |
| Eurostoxx Index | 2154.3 | 20.3 | 0.95% |
| Oil (WTI) | 90.56 | 0.7 | 0.73% |
| LIBOR | 0.467 | 0.000 | 0.00% |
| US Dollar Index (DXY) | 82.14 | 0.046 | 0.06% |
| 10 Year Govt Bond Yield | 1.75% | 0.02% | |
| RPX Composite Real Estate Index | 176.7 | 0.5 |
Markets are giving up earlier gains on the back of some disappointing economic reports. Euro sovereigns are higher with the exception of Greece which now yields 30% and Portugal. Bonds are down a point and MBS are down a few ticks as well.
The Durable Goods headline number came in at +.2%, more or less in line with expectations, but DG ex transportation fell .6%. Cap Goods orders and shipments both fell. This metric tracks business investment and is an ominous sign for the economy. This might explain why HP is laying off 27,000 workers.
Initial Jobless claims came in at 370k, in line with expectations.
Freddie Mac released their Economic and Housing Outlook yesterday. It mainly re-hashes data we have already seen. They are of the view that housing is at or near bottom and that rental vacancies are at 9-year lows.
The housing market had another positive data point with the Toll Brother’s earnings announcement. Toll is in the McMansion business, so this report focuses more on the high end. Q2 revenues rose 14% YOY, but signed contracts increased 51%. Backlog was up 49%. Granted, we are coming off of a low base, but you are starting to see some life in homebuilding. Doug Yearley, CEO said “It appears that the housing market has moved into a new and stronger phase of recovery as we have experienced broad-based improvement across most of our regions over the past six months. The spring selling season has been the most robust and sustained since the downturn began.” Granted, he is talking his book, but still…
Filed under: Morning Report |
All Things in Moderation 
Worth a read:
“The LTRO operations seem to have reinforced the dangerous link between weak banks and the overly indebted governments in the periphery of the Euro zone. According to the Bundesbank, the increase of sovereign bond purchases by private banks in the first quarter was mainly caused
“by Spanish and Italian banks who almost entirely bought sovereign bonds of their domestic government”.
This is really bad news.”
http://economicsintelligence.com/2012/05/24/killed-by-friendly-fire-the-euro-zone-and-draghis-big-bertha/
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The two articles you have cited and the one I have cited all refer to the “periphery” as a “known”. I assume Portugal, Ireland, and Greece are in the periphery. What about Finland and Estonia?
Is this geographical, or does it refer to a “core” being the old Common Market of Germany, France, Italy, and BeNeLux?
I still don’t understand why Spain fell so hard. It apparently has a productive work force and had balanced budgets, as well as long term steady growth.
Obviously, if Alexander Hamilton were alive, he would propose the federal solution, which has been noted by two of the articles we have cited. However, a federal solution without a federal gummint makes no sense, right?
So the periphery, whatever it is, spins off? That should not change world trade. We would still import kalamata olives from Greece, for example. If we paid them in hard currency, $$$, they could buy from us using our dollars, right? The financial collapse would be felt in the financial community – how would it respond?
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Posted without comment.
http://freebeacon.com/senate-dems-betray-lilly/
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McWing:
Something about a petard and hoisting comes to mind. Of course, IOKIYAADW.
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“markinaustin, on May 24, 2012 at 12:40 pm said:
Obviously, if Alexander Hamilton were alive, he would propose the federal solution, which has been noted by two of the articles we have cited. However, a federal solution without a federal gummint makes no sense, right?”
The other point noted about the comparison with Hamilton is that the Federal Constitution had to be approved politically first before he could made his proposal to assume the debts. The Constitution never would have been ratified if the state debt assumption proposal was known at the time of ratification.
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i think it’s more like, it’s okay if you’re a member of congress
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Well, you could argue that Europe has tried a unified government at least twice in the last 100 years. I dont think Federalism is viable with that much cultural differences.
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troll, I note that the highly partisan link you posted is absolutely silent about Republicans and suspect nova is correct although I do not have that data. Is posting this link intended to foster discussion or just to score some quick, cheap partisan points? That seems to me to belittle an issue that is real.
And for the record, as far as this girl is concerned, it’s not IOKIYAADW or even IOKIYAAD.
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okie:
That seems to me to belittle an issue that is real.
I think it is a clever way of demonstrating that the issue is not as real as some people might believe. I for one highly doubt that those Democratic women are in fact discriminating against the women who work for them. There are, I presume, legitimate, non-sexist reasons for the disparity in pay, reasons which are not accounted for when looking at simple, mathematical averages. Yet this simple mathematical average is precisely the approach that is routinely taken, for example, by those who continually trot out the trope that women make 77 cents (or whatever the figure is these days) for every dollar that men make in order to demonstrate how real this sex-discrimination problem really is.
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Speaking of an employer’s sex discrimination….
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What do the strings of capitalized letters mean?
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It’s OK If You Are A Democratic Woman (or just Democat)
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Hooters has faced several such EEOC investigations over the years. I don’t recall how they got past them, but based on my most recent independent inquiry, they are doing so by hiring uglier waitresses.
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There are, I presume, legitimate, non-sexist reasons for the disparity in pay, reasons which are not accounted for when looking at simple, mathematical averages.
Having the Federal government step in and equalize pay based on any factor is likely to be an ever-unfolding Chinese puzzle box of endless litigation (given the number of legislators that are lawyers, this seems likely to be the point).
Also, any gender pay gap legislation will have the necessary loopholes for situations such a described—no act designed to limit gender discrimination in compensation is going to mandate that a recently hired female secretary is compensated at the same wage as a VP that’s been with the company 20 years. And if seniority, job titles, and credentials are allowed as reasons for different pay scales (and certainly, they will be), the world will remain full of women working twice as hard as their male counterpart in the next office, yet getting only 2/3rd the compensation (and vice-versa).
Where I work (and most places I have worked), compensation has been tied to job title, seniority, credentials (you can do the exact same thing, day in and day out, but get $10k more per year because you’ve got a Ph.D). It’s interesting that such codified discrimination is entirely acceptable (and, no doubt, will continue to be), when it’s still essentially paying two different people differing amounts for the same work (or, in many cases, paying more for less and less for more).
Also, entertainment and sports fields and many others will get amnesty. Which will provide grounds for arguments that if they get to do it, why don’t I?
If a company consciously wanted to discriminate, it seems likely they could do so easily enough by how the define the position, either by job title or credentials, or some other factor—or by offering favored male employees perks or bonuses that will likely fall outside the purview of the law, instead of giving the position a raise.
This is not an issue that will ever have a resolution that will make anybody happy. I can almost guarantee it. 🙂
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troll, I note that the highly partisan link you posted is absolutely silent about Republicans and suspect nova is correct although I do not have that data. Is posting this link intended to foster discussion or just to score some quick, cheap partisan points?
I would not assume the latter. My immediate reaction is that it’s an illustration of what a thorny problem it is to address, and that we’re likely fooling ourselves if we believe well-meaning gender-equity legislation is going to produce some sort of net-positive outcome that pleases anybody, or does anything seriously to make compensation “more fair”.
It’s also an excellent example of a peculiar human habit of castigating our neighbors for their own poorly-kept houses with our own houses are clearly not in order. Interesting that it did not even occur to them to check, or know, how the people in their own offices were compensated (or, if they knew, that they did not even recognize the gender disparity) . . . if true. Partisan sources should always be taken with a grain of salt, though that does not mean they may not have a point.
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Congress has exempted itself and the Executive branch from the reach of much of American employment law.
Thus it was that a Senator from OR was a serial violator of his female staff’s dignity, and only faced reprimand in the Senate, despite the fact that he could have been successfully sued as a private employer in commerce. Packwood resigned in ’95.
WJC could have traded promises of continued or enhanced employment for BJs from his female aides and not violated the law, b/c it did not apply to him.
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“markinaustin, on May 25, 2012 at 12:59 pm said:
WJC could have traded promises of continued or enhanced employment for BJs from his female aides and not violated the law, b/c it did not apply to him.”
“When the president does it, that means that it is not illegal” – Nixon
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ejvyDn1TPr8
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Guys, thanks for the comments on equal pay. It’s a topic I would like to discuss but cannot right now. Have pinched a nerve in my arm and cannot use right hand. Keyboarding is difficult and painful so I’ll repost hopefully in couple days if there’s interest.
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I just helped Jen put the twins to sleep.
Their Montessori School must be cool. They are 3.3 YOs, and we played a “find the shapes” game before they went to sleep. It was mundane that they picked out squares, circles, and rectangles in the room, but they went on to tell us how many sides various shapes had, including pentagons and octagons. I asked if they ever saw an octagon, and they yelled “stop sign!” Then Rebecca said “we don’t have a trapezoid in our room.”
Trapezoid!
For their next trick, they began to call colors in Spanish. I thought “trapezoid” was a real highlight, however.
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