If there is one binding thought amongst us today, I would guess that we are all a little bit uncertain about the economy still. I’ve read a number of articles talking about the good and bad of Obama’s actions. The net of all of them is that there are still two sides to every issue and there is no absolute answer just different approaches to generally make life better. I don’t think any of the policymakers are trying to do a bad job or trying to make the US socialist. It’s just a flurry of different approaches. The question in my mind is whether consumer confidence is picking up or dropping off and are we moving from general uncertainty to a more positive place as a country.
Here is what I think we can all acknowledge. Unemployment has dropped from 9.5 to 9.4. Of course the question is how much of that drop is because people are self selecting out of the job search. Non-farm job loss slowed to 247,000 in June. That looks fairly promising that we are beginning to see a change. So, the labor market appears to be gettig less unhealthy than in previous months and perhaps is on the way up.
The nugget of good news that I found particularly comforting was that Freddie Mac posted positive net income and has declared it will ask for no more money from the government. That bit of good news seems to have gone unnoticed by many of the large television news broadcasts.
The next topic I will be following is the impact of countries who have beenthe recipient of many of the outsourcing efforts like China and India. Recently, I have been reading about the prosperity of China. On the surface, this sounded like very positive news and indeed it is. I think the flip side of that issue is that China’s people will become more prosperous and ultimately begin to seek more expensive goods. This will drive up labor costs and potentially erode China’s price competitiveness. Perhaps, this will bring more manufacturing jobs back tithe US and reinvigorate those part of the country that have been hit very hard by the recession.
I think that optimism will be a personal and business competitive advantage through all of this uncertainty.
- Dana
