U.S. Population Changes Over Time...

This is a fascinating animated graph by Bill McBride at Calculated Risk.  Amongst other things, it makes obvious the reasons for the current and future insolvency of the Social Security system.  Way back when, before FDR, there were vastly more people of working age than of retirement age.  Today, not so much.  In the future, even less.

Of course there are many other repercussions of the demographic changes as well.  For instance, think what it means for healthcare costs, or number of doctors needed per capita, or economic growth, or any of dozens of other topics.

Study this for a while and you'll understand a lot about the dynamics that are affecting this country.  It might also make you rethink opposition to immigration (the vast majority of immigrants are under 30 years old)...

If You're Unreasonably Happy, and Need a Downer...

Go read this:  Five scary charts and facts about who’s working and not working in this economy.  Mary Katherine Ham ruined my day, and that's not what gazing at her smiling face usually does for me...

It Could Be Worse!

Via reader Jim M.:

But not everyone is as lucky as I am...

The economy is so bad that I got a pre-declined credit card in the mail.

I ordered a burger at McDonald's, and the kid behind the counter asked, "Can you afford fries with that?"

CEO's are now playing miniature golf.

If the bank returns your check marked "Insufficient Funds," you have to call them and ask if they mean you or them.

Hot Wheels and Matchbox stocks are trading higher than GM.

McDonald's is selling the 1/4 'ouncer'.

Parents in Beverly Hills and Malibu are firing their nannies and learning their children's names.

A truckload of Americans was caught sneaking into Mexico.

Dick Cheney took his stockbroker hunting.

Motel Six won't leave the light on anymore.

The Mafia is laying off judges.

BP Oil laid off 25 Congressmen.

Congress says they are looking into the Bernard Madoff scandal. Oh Great! The guy who made $50 Billion disappear is being investigated by the people who made $1.5 Trillion disappear!

And, finally...

I was so depressed last night thinking about the economy, wars, jobs, my savings, Social Security, retirement funds, and our bleak future, that I called the Suicide Lifeline and was connected to a call center inPakistan. When I told them I was suicidal, they got all excited and asked if I could drive a truck.

ResMed Leaving California?

Via reader and friend Simon M.:

ResMed Inc., one of San Diego’s largest medical device companies, is evaluating whether it should move its headquarters outside of California.

ResMed CEO Peter C. Farrell cited California’s tax increases, strengthening union presence, strict regulations and the Democratic majority in the state Legislature as reasons the company is looking elsewhere. The company posted revenue of more than $1 billion last year.

Read the whole thing.

As Simon says, “Bet we see more of this...”

Remember These Folks...

...when you vote on November 6.

Deadbeat...

Two Economic Leading Indicators...

...and both are pointing down, strongly.  Dang.  Looks like we might not be headed for a recovery just yet...

Obama Built That!

Screen capture of FoxNews front page yesterday. Pretty much says it, eh?

Via my mom:

Obama's Big Problem...

I suspect that this is the main reason why Obama finds his re-election for a second term ... challenging.

Unemployment Down and Up...

I've and others been railing about the government's extremely misleading “unemployment rate” numbers, which the lamestream media generally parrots without comment.  For April, this published number dropped slightly to 8.1%.  However, the actual number of people who are unemployed climbed substantially.  How can this be?  Why, through the magic of blatant statistics manipulation, of course.  Bruce McQuain has a nice explanation, and also raises a related point about older workers.

But a funny thing seems to be happening on the way to the November elections.  The lamestream media is belatedly paying attention to this manipulation.  A few newspapers and reporting organizations talking about this may not seem like a big deal, but...they haven't been doing so heretofore, and we're in the runup to the 2012 Presidential election.  Somehow I don't think this is a good omen for Obama.

Which is just fine with me, of course...

USA: The Highest...

The highest what?  The highest corporate income tax rate.  In the world.  Starting on April 1st.  From an opinion piece in today's WSJ:

April 1 is a date that every politician and business executive in America should circle on the calendar. That's when Japan cuts its corporate tax rate to 36.8% from 39.5%. The United States will then hold the title of highest corporate tax rate, with average combined federal and state profit levies of 39.2%.

Yes, that's higher than Sweden. Higher than Russia. And China, Mexico, Denmark and even France. Doesn't it make you want to break out in a chant: U-S-A, U-S-A? 

I can almost hear the progressives cheering.  “Yes!”, they'll say.  We're leading the world, as we should be.

Me?  I just cry for my country's future.

And, as always, remain amazed at how little attention issues like this get from everyday people.  As though they don't matter...

Google's Unemployment Index...

...just took a big spike up.  As always, I'm not sure what that really means (other than that Google is seeing more searches related to unemployment)...

Remember This When You Vote...

On the evidence of past elections, one must assume that the average American voter's memory is approximately as capacious as that of an earthworm.  Therefore I feel quite safe in assuming that by the November 2012 elections, the average voter will have completely forgotten the promises and projections of then-candidate Obama with respect to unemployment.

So I present the chart at right (courtesy of Innocent Bystanders) to refresh everyone's memory.  According to projections by Obama and his trusty sidekick Tim, at this point we should be at 7.2% unemployment if we hadn't implemented the Obama stimulus program at all.  And with the stimulus program, we should be at a much more comfortable 6.3% unemployment (all of these unemployment numbers are the bogus, “cooked” numbers that leave out the “discouraged” (but still very much unemployed) workers.

So what's the lesson here? That Obama and his cronies are lying sacks of shit?

No, I don't think so.  I think they really believed those projections, and that the real lesson (as if it was actually needed!) is that they have no idea what they're doing.

So please, dear American voters...remember this when you vote next November...

Debt Ceiling Logic...

Via reader Jim M.:

If you can answer this correctly, you can answer the question on what action to take on raising the Federal debt ceiling.

You come home from work and find there has been a sewer backup and you have sewage up to your ceilings.  What do you do, raise the ceilings, or pump out the crap?

Those Tricksy Employment Reports...

From a WSJ piece on Friday's unemployment report:

The unemployment rate fell to 9.4% from 9.8%, which led to celebration in some Washington quarters. But that improvement was largely because 260,000 eligible workers dropped out of the labor force.

The unemployment report these days, as reported by our curiously uncurious lamestream media, is biased by the “adjustment” described above: unemployed workers who have stopped looking for work (usually because they've given up) are not called unemployed for the purposes of this report.

So this time, as it has several times in the past year, the unemployment rate “declined” mostly because we stopped counting 260,000 unemployed people as unemployed.  This gives the public (most of whom have no idea this trick is being used) a decidedly incorrect impression about what's happening.

On the flip side, when the job market finally does start to (really) pick up again, many of those so-called discouraged workers will start looking for work again.  When that happens, they'll be counted as unemployed once more – and the reported unemployment number will go back up!  Once again, the public will be deceived – but this time, they'll think the situation is worse than it really is.

Wouldn't it be simpler and better to just report the real number, and to separately report how many have just plain given up?  I certainly think so.

Meanwhile, some conservatives are already anticipating a schadenfreude moment around the summer of 2012.  They're thinking that the economy will likely be improving by then, the unemployment rate will appear to be going up (for the reasons given above) – and Obama will be running for reelection...

How to Cut the Deficit, Painlessly...

Well, painlessly for the taxpayer, anyway.  As Byron York points out, taxpayer savings of $40B to $47B annually could be generated simply by freezing government workers' pay until it comes into line with what non-government workers are paid to do similar work.  This is at least conceivable, politically – particularly if the Democrats are soundly thrashed in November.

What I'd really like to see happen, though, is that government workers' total compensation (pension included) is capped at parity to non-government worker levels – and average less – say 80% or 85%.  For the good of our economy, government jobs should be unattractive.  The only high-paying government jobs should be in the military.

Of course there's no way that any Democrat – or the vast majority of Republicans – would ever go for my proposal.  The thoroughly-entrenched bureaucratic special interests will see to that...

Sobering CBO Report...

The non-partisan Congressional Budget Office (CBO) has released a sobering report titled Federal Debt and the Risk of a Fiscal Crisis (PDF).  The graph at right is taken from that report.  So is this warning:

Further increases in federal debt relative to the nation’s output (gross domestic product, or GDP) almost certainly lie ahead if current policies remain in place. The aging of the population and rising costs for health care will push federal spending, measured as a percentage of GDP, well above the levels experienced in recent decades. Unless policymakers restrain the growth of spending, increase revenues significantly as a share of GDP, or adopt some combination of those two approaches, growing budget deficits will cause debt to rise to unsupportable levels.

I recommend reading the entire report. It's only a few pages long, and is written for laymen.  It took me quite aback to see the CBO is looking at the experiences of Argentina, Greece, and Ireland (countries that had or have comparable debt loads) to forecast what's going to happen to us.

Basically the advice in the report boils down to this: Stop spending so damned much borrowed money!  Quickly!

Uh Oh...

Another week, another Google Unemployment Index report.  This really looks bad – the number of unemployment-related queries has almost doubled in the past few weeks.  I'm still not entirely sure how this report correlates to our economy's health, but it's really hard to see any way for this to be good news...

Latest Google Unemployment Index...

Well, this looks encouraging (click to enlarge).  It looks like many fewer people are searching for unemployment-related topics these days.  We had one other dip near the beginning of last year, but other than that the level has been roughly steady since the end of 2008.  Let's hope that this is a continuing trend, and a leading indicator on economic recovery.  Oh, and let's also hope that Greece et al don't drag us all down into the economic swamps, too...

Sheesh, that's a lot of hoping, isn't it?

California is in Eigth Place...

Sheesh...