Jan 282013
 
Evergreen State economy: Uh, oh

I wish it were otherwise, but no matter: If Washington State’s economy were a stock, I’d be tempted to go short*. I’m no expert. I know only what I read. My gut tells me that the longer the 787 remains grounded, the more likely Boeing will have to redesign the [continue reading . . . ]

Oct 302012
 
Fix the fisc? Not a chance

In the decade through Fiscal 2008, Uncle Sam spent at the rate of about 19.4% of U.S. gross domestic product (GDP), and took money in at the rate of about 18.3% of GDP, resulting in annual deficits of about 1.1% of GDP. In Fiscal 1999, at the start of that [continue reading . . . ]

Aug 182012
 
Too many Canadians?

That’s the headline on Page 1 of the Seattle Times today. The article reports that some residents of the Bellingham area, an easy drive from the Canadian border, are grumbling that Canadian shoppers are overcrowding the parking lots of Costco Wholesale and other box stores on the U.S. side of the [continue reading . . . ]

May 302012
 

Uh, oh. That’s what I find myself muttering these days when I fire up the news browser or open my morning papers. The economic news leaves me with a sense of dread. I find three developments especially worrisome: 1. Europe’s slow-motion economic crisis, now more than three years old, rumbles [continue reading . . . ]

May 162012
 

Are America’s best days in the rear-view mirror? The Economist‘s Lexington columnist reminds us (May 12, 2012, print edition) that bouts of what it labels “declinism” are, well, almost as American as apple pie. It wasn’t so long ago that Japan was buying up iconic U.S. real estate (New York [continue reading . . . ]

Apr 112012
 

“For Big Companies, Life is Good.” That was the headline on the Marketplace Section front page of the Wall Street Journal April 9. The item reported that sales, profits and employment of the largest American companies, the Standard and Poor’s 500, last year exceeded the highs reached before the Great [continue reading . . . ]

Jan 182012
 
U.S. competitive in manufacturing?

As I mentioned on KUOW’s Weekday program today, I was delighted to read in today’s Financial Times* that manufacturing employment has grown faster in the U.S. during this recovery than in any other advanced country. From January 2010, employment in U.S. factories has risen by 2.9% to nearly 11.8 million [continue reading . . . ]

May 072011
 

Delivered with my New York Times on May 6, what is labeled the “Seattle Inaugural Issue” of China Daily, self-described as “the national English-language newspaper of the People’s Republic of China.” The paper runs 20 pages and is relatively unremarkable, with a couple of exceptions. First, there are almost no [continue reading . . . ]