Ok first I'm not cherry picking anything so don't even try barking up that tree. I'm literally reporting all of the major economic data that's coming out. Secondly there have been largely positive numbers since we left the recession in 2009. The hole was so big that it took years to recover. Third I will continue to report these results objectively indefinitely as long as the Buzzboard is alive and well. Fourth if the economy starts growing at 4 or 5% the fed will panic and raise rates faster than it planned in an effort to cool it off so we don't get high inflation and an eventual recession from overheating. Fifth the first part of the statement you selected is nothing more than pent up demand. The second part is related to the overheating comment above. If they start doing more because of tax and regulatory relaxation expect Yellen and company to step in and check it if it gets out of hand.Bryce wrote:Pretty easy to cherry pick positive numbers in a narrow time frame.
Fact is, Obama will leave office with an average GDP during his time in office at about 1.6 percent. Even the Carter economy beat those numbers by quite a bit.
I don't think you could find too many people.that would tell you the Carter economy was very good.
The following from above should.not.be.discounted:
Some manufacturers reported a bounce in their clients' willingness to spend after the November election, as uncertainty about the result had lifted. Several surveys of business confidence have also shown that executives are hopeful for fewer regulations and lower taxes under the new administration
Finally I have a few pieces of data today. We'll start with the ADP Private Sector Payrolls Report for December which showed a gain of 153,000 jobs which is slightly below the full 2016 monthly average:
WASHINGTON (AP) — U.S. companies reported a modest gain of 153,000 jobs last month, all in service industries such as retail and health care. The report provided the latest evidence of the economy's transition away from manufacturing and other blue-collar work.
Payroll provider ADP said Thursday that hotels and restaurants added 18,000 jobs in December, while higher-paying professional and business services, such as engineering, added 24,000. Manufacturers lost 9,000 jobs and construction firms shed 2,000.
Hiring has been steady this year, but most of it has been in both higher- and lower-paying service jobs. Factories, by contrast, have cut workers as a strong dollar and weak overseas growth have hammered exports of U.S. goods.
The mining industry, which includes oil and gas drilling, also lost jobs last year amid low energy prices. Those trends pose challenges for President-elect Donald Trump's plans to boost job growth in those sectors.
The report also points to a modest slowdown in hiring. Businesses added a robust 215,000 jobs in November. Hiring averaged 174,000 jobs a month in 2016, according to ADP, down from an average of 209,000 in 2015. Most economists expect job gains to slow a bit more in 2017 because businesses have a smaller pool of unemployed people to hire from.
The economy picked up in the July-September quarter, expanding at a solid 3.5 percent annual rate, but growth is expected to be sluggish for all of 2016. Still, consumer confidence has jumped since the election, particularly among Republican voters, and the stock market is near record highs.
Businesses are also confident enough in future consumer demand to hold onto their workers. Applications for unemployment benefits, a proxy for layoffs, fell to just 235,000 last week, nearly the lowest level since 1973.
The ADP data cover only private businesses and often diverge from official figures. Economists forecast that the government's jobs report, to be released Friday, will show a gain of 173,000, according to data provider FactSet.
That report may also show that the unemployment rate ticked up to 4.7 percent in December, up from 4.6 percent the previous month, economists expect. Still, that is a low rate that suggests employers may have to offer higher pay to attract and keep workers. That could deliver broader pay gains for more Americans.