Business Trends

by Raymond J. Keating – The Census Bureau has reported that housing starts took a dive in July, with permits not faring well either. In fact, after having a nice run during the pandemic economy, housing starts have now fallen back to below their pre-pandemic level: ● Housing starts (at a seasonally adjusted annual rate) […]

by Raymond J. Keating – The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics on the morning of August 10 served up the much anticipated inflation data for July. The Consumer Price Index (CPI) for July came in flat, i.e., 0 percent. Inflation has been raging since early 2021. And even with the 0 percent increase in CPI […]

by Raymond J. Keating –  Productivity often is treated like an economic mystery. But there’s no real mystery about productivity. Nonfarm business sector labor productivity, or output per hour, is determined “by dividing an index of real output by an index of hours worked by all persons, including employees, proprietors, and unpaid family workers.” Productivity […]

by Raymond J. Keating – The headline for the July employment report certainly was positive, with the establishment survey pointing to nonfarm payroll employment increasing by a robust 528,000. As noted in the report, “Job growth was widespread, led by gains in leisure and hospitality, professional and business services, and health care.” As SBE Council […]

by Raymond J. Keating – Coming on the heels of a grim GDP report pointing to recession, no one should have expected anything good in the latest personal income report released on July 29. And as it turned out, there wasn’t anything positive in this latest economic measure. For June, the 0.6 percent nominal increase […]

SMALL BUSINESS INSIDER by Raymond J. Keating –  The back-of-the-envelope definition of a recession is two consecutive quarters of negative real GDP growth. Well, based on the first estimate of gross domestic product for the second quarter of 2022, the U.S. has slipped into recession, with growth coming in at -1.6 percent in the first […]

  by Raymond J. Keating – According to the Federal Open Market Committee’s statement on monetary policy released on July 27, the Fed “is strongly committed to returning inflation to its 2 percent objective.” The evidence for the Fed’s seriousness supposedly is found in its jacking up the targeted range for federal funds rate to […]

SMALL BUSINESS INSIDER Americans are retiring later in life and starting businesses at a healthy rate in their older years. by Raymond J. Keating –  Gallup just released a poll highlighting that Americans retire, and expect to retire at a later age today than in the recent past. For example, in 1991, retirees reported that […]

by Raymond J. Keating –  We haven’t taken a look at foreign direct investment data from the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) in a while, and that’s unfortunate. Just as the free movement of goods and services across international borders creates value and expands opportunity for consumers, workers, entrepreneurs and businesses, so does the […]

by Raymond J. Keating –  The latest state employment report from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) makes clear how the jobs picture varies widely by state. As noted by the BLS, “Nonfarm payroll employment increased in 13 states, decreased in 2 states, and was essentially unchanged in 35 states and the District of […]