Sunday, August 22, 2010

Űbernomics?

"Superman is wearing black, red and gold this year, Germany's national colors," said Carsten Brzeski, an economist at ING Group in Brussels
While market and economy watchers looked at the rise in German, French, and Italian GDP as a momentary consequence of currency fluctuation.
When was the last time the New York Times front page featured a headline with the words "German Surge"? I bet never since WWII.
Maybe they just like to imagine themselves in tights, or the point where they will imagine the implausible and illogical to stroke their own chickens:
In annualized terms, the German economy expanded about 9 percent in the second quarter, said Andreas Scheuerle, an economist at Dekabank in Frankfurt. That puts it on a footing with emerging markets like China and India.
Don't get wrapped around the axle, Axel. This isn't about German workers' souls, Keynsian government Astroglide, or any other over-emotionalized inference.

The data came with a few clues as to what it can tell us about the near term: to the same variant as with GDP growth, France and Italy also did well to a lesser degree, commensurate with their growth in exports. In other words, the champions of Q2 in order were Germany, Italy, and then France.

It's backward looking, and correlates to the 2 months following the Euro bottoming out at $1,18 which discounted anything exporters are able to sell, and we know where the exporters are.

While we find that again the gap between German and Greek and Irish bond rates widening, an indicator of low confidence, we may find another bifurcated outcome. If the net effect will be another soft spot for the Euro, the exporters will be busy again, and the entire eurozone population will have lost purchasing power again.

The rather small amount of that growth being attributed to domestic consumption follows toward the end of Q2, with worker activity higher and a rising Euro.

Some in Europe can’t but help and find signs of their inherent human superiority in a one-time / one quarter currency induced bump. It’s a silly thing to do when there are people seriously talking about an economically lost generation:
"Europe fears for its lost generation," the Czech daily Hospodářské noviny declares, leading with the claim that the level of youth unemployment is now the highest since the second world war. A report by the confirms that five million young Europeans were without work in 2009, with Spain the worst hit, with 40% of young people jobless, followed by the Baltic states
Obviously looking to take it out on ‘the Man”, the UK’s Independent asks:
"Who would want to be 18 today?" it asks, when even those who get into college are likely to emerge into a depressed job market weighed down with debt.
It’s the usual dichotomy of wavering between megalomania and imaginary humiliations and the like.

No comments: