Dailyjobsupdate.com has a wealth of real time information that attempts to track the direction of the economy. It pays particular attention to payroll taxes withheld and remitted to the Treasury. The following chart plots the year over year growth rate in this indicator versus the S&P 500. The following chart shows a very tight correlation between the two.
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PIMCO has come out with a research report suggesting that the housing recovery may take longer to ripple through the economy due to a variety of factors. That is less interesting to me than the authors’ assertion that “New residential construction needs to double from 2012 levels to meet long-run stable demand…”
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I came across an interesting research paper from the Federal Reserve related to household formations. Here’s the title, author, date, and link:
The Long and the Short of Household Formation
Andrew Pacioreky
April 1, 2013
http://www.federalreserve.gov/pubs/feds/2013/201326/201326pap.pdf
The supply of housing is fairly easy to quantify from statistics published related to building permits and housing starts.
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This is from October 1, 1929. A pretty sad tale of a bridge game gone awry and an extreme example of how marital pressures and resentments can build up to a boiling point. The wife shot the husband after an argument in which she called him “a bum bridge player.” I can’t do the story justice by excerpting it so I think it’s worth the time and getting out your magnifying glass to read the short piece.
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These are two interesting charts that I saw on the Carpe Diem Blog (well worth visiting) regarding the incredible productivity related to U.S. natural gas production. The industry has been able to produce about 6 times the gas per active rig as it did in 2008.
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