Nov 3 2008
Blue Collar Economic Indicators
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- Post Office plans first layoff
- WalMart Thefts Shift Toward Basics
- You Really Know the Economy is Bad when Google Adsense Needs to Boost Your Confidence
- What the Economic Indicators Miss
- Obscure Economic Indicators from Slate.com
- Misleading Economic Indicators
- Layoff Tracker
A few observations of mine:
- More people in the office brown-bagging lunch
- More small tv’s on display in the stores
- I know Christmas is far, but the stores seem very quiet
- Job listings seem very sparse
Personally I think:
- Mass layoffs are right around the corner.
- We’re going to be pushing 8% unemployment, probably around 7.5% by mid ‘09.
- Auto industry is just the start. We’ll see a cycle of industrial companies on the brink of bankruptcy.
My opinion is that we must to a degree let the market sort itself out. If it is a Saudi company foolishly investing in GM so be it. If it is a merger of 2 failing giants so be it. If it is a bankruptcy of an industry so be it. On a global scale we must adhere to comparative advantage. America’s best companies that are the world’s best are so because of a fundamental Darwinian premise – Survival of the Fittest.
And of course I can’t blog without putting in a few stock picks. Despite the drop in oil recently, I’m going long in oil. In typical fair I am going leveraged going long via DBO.
Be sure to vote tomorrow!
