Thoughts from the Frontline

It’s All About the Jobs… and Gold

By John Mauldin

September 4, 2011

Choose your language

The Flat Earth (Employment) Society
Let’s Do a Little Time Travel
The Implications of an Older Workforce
How Do We “Fix” the Employment Problem?
Some Thoughts on Gold
Europe, New York, Conferences, Etc.

This week we briefly look at yesterday morning’s dismal unemployment report, then drop back and survey some other very eye-opening data on employment. Some groups are (surprise) doing better than others. What would it take to get us back to “normal,” whatever that is? I give you a link to some webinars I will be involved in and finish with the answer to the question I am asked most often, “What do you think about gold?” I tell all. There are lots of topics to cover, so let’s get started with no “but firsts.” (Note: this e-letter may print out rather long, as there are LOTS of charts and tables.)

The Flat Earth (Employment) Society

Unless you were completely out of touch this weekend, you know the jobs report came in flat, as in zero, nada, “0”. The economy was in neutral, at least as far as employment was concerned. But flat is actually down, as we need 125,000 jobs a month (at least) just to stay up with population growth. And, as we will see in a few pages, it may well…

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Joe Toronto

Sep. 6, 2011, 2:49 p.m.

Jobs come from one thing…. increased sales, not lower taxes or lower regulations. No employer of any size is going to squander a newfound taxcut on hiring employees to sit around. He must have new sales and customers to service… period.

The Republicans are delusional if they think that lowering taxes or reducing regulations alone will cause employers to hire… and they have no proposals whatsoever to stimulate aggragate demand, which incidentally, will in fact cause employment to increase.

Aggregate demand = new jobs. End of story.

Terry Gamber

Sep. 6, 2011, 12:51 a.m.

The European market futures continue to fall tonight. The Eurozone banks were pummeled yesterday and the DAX was down 5%. The Endgame is happening now since the banks are woefully undercapitalized if sovereign debt is not guaranteed. The head of Deutsche Bank said today that only the strong banks will survive implying many failures. The contagion is spreading with Dow futures down 230 points at this time. What is a safe place to hide? Cash or gold?

Russ Abbott

Sep. 5, 2011, 6:17 p.m.

John,

Here are a couple of <a href = “http://delong.typepad.com/sdj/2011/09/against-zombie-macroeconomics-one-more-time.html”>additional graphs</a> you should look at.

GEORGE DELTA

Sep. 5, 2011, 5:30 p.m.

I agree with Russ Abbott’s comments.  You have been writing good letters with considerable factual analysis that I have been reading for about a decade, but the inane Republican commentary has made parts of them almost unreadable. 

For example, even if the South Side Slickster were to eliminate four regs a day, I cannot imagine that this would create too many jobs.  We lack jobs because of three decades of policies that have consciously benefitted the upper 1% at the expense of the rest of us and encouraged offshoring.  It turns out that Perot was rigt about NAFTA.  It enriched American and Mexican oligarchs, but it did nothing for working stiffs here.  I still hear that giant sucking sound of jobs leaving thhe U.S.

Then there is the remark “even if somehow a Republican appeared in the White House tomorrow, there is no magic he (or she!) could bring with him/her to fix the unemployment problem.”  This is beyond silly.  What will Rick Perry do to improve the economy, pray?  Maybe we can have a prayerfest for jobs while simultaneously try to pray away the gay.  Michele Bachmann is crazy and nasty, and she can no more run a country than she could a school PTA.  I cannot imagine any sentient human being like you would vote for her.  Romney has a history of job destruction at Bain Capital.  You get the idea.  I am fed up with the Chosen One, too, but please tell me which Republican has the potential to improve any aspect of the lives of most Americans.  I am not holding my breath for your response.

Finally, while you are reciting statistics (an important public service in itself), have you thought about how we are going to get out of this vicious feedback loop?  No recovery can last unless we restrain the financial sector and its rent extraction and make it a smaller portion of our economy, reduce income inequality, increase taxes on you and me, and end the control corporations have over our body politic where their money equals “free speech.”  You might want to read what your friend Barry Ritholtz has to say on the subject and his link to a WaPo article on the subject:  http://www.ritholtz.com/blog/2011/09/wp-report-on-breakaway-wealth/.  If we do not restrain the fianncial sector, jobs will not magically appear, and we will not have a lasting recovery. 

Reinhold Niebuhr observed in his 1932 treatise Moral Man Immoral Society (p. 117):  “The moral attitudes of dominant and privileged groups are characterized by universal self-deception and hypocrisy….  [S]pecial privilege can be defended in terms of the rational ideal of equal justice only by proving that it contributes something to the good of the whole.  Since inequalities of privilege are greater than could possibly be defended rationally, the intelligence of privileged groups is usually applied to the task of inventing specious proofs for the theory that universal values spring from, and general interests are served by, the special privileges which they hold.  The most common form of hypocrisy among the privileged classes is to assume that their privileges are the just payments with which society rewards specially useful or meritorious functions.” 

DCCynic George

Joe Jerman

Sep. 5, 2011, 1:54 p.m.

I can remember back in 2008 I was told that as a boomer (born in 1946) that I would always be needed in the work force as the generations after us (1966 and forward) were lacking so much in numbers that we would be needed to fill the workforce or we would need to increase immigration.

Jon Parker

Sep. 5, 2011, 11:41 a.m.

The chart of Civilian Employment Ratio shows that we did not get back the jobs that were lost in the dot com bust.  This happened even with tax cuts and huge dificit spending.  The chart that you posted from Rob Arnott, Civilian Employment and Labor Force, showed a decline since 1980 as he pointed out.  These two charts show a long term structural change that will not be corrected by a simplistic “get government out of the way” approach.  My personal view is that it is tied to the declind in manufacturing.  We won’t have a strong economy with only low paying service jobs.

P.S.  Let’s take the Global Warming discussion to other websites.  You are not going to change views here.

Darryl Andrews 28803

Sep. 5, 2011, 10:14 a.m.

Gentlemen, on climate and effects, there are many different things to consider when you are trying to determine how man is affecting the earth’s temperature.  I submit an example:  Mount Pinatubo, Philippines, on June 12, 1991 (just Google it).  This eruption put so much gas (an unbelievable amount of sulfuric gas, couple of breaths and it will kill you) and ash in the air, it lowered the earthâ??s temperature for 2 years.  This is a fact.  There will be others.  So when deciding if man is the culprit for global warming, just remember that Mother Nature can/will be a player.

Charles Yaker

Sep. 4, 2011, 2:10 p.m.

Warren Mosler has written a piece suggesting a plan that would put America Back to work but I don’t expect any one to read it. Why I don’t know because the people who believe in MMT are serious people in addition to Mosler. John even said so in commenting about the Levy Institute. While he said it about Michael Hudson it would have to be true of Randy Wray as well. IMHO failing to acknowledge MMT and criticize thten is intellectual dishonesty. None the less here is the link to Mosler’s plan written in the form of the speech Obama could give but you have to give up an acceptance of the deficit myths to accept it.
http://moslereconomics.com/

JOSEPH HAGEDORN

Sep. 4, 2011, 2:07 p.m.

Joseph G. Hagedorn

The glaciers and Iceland are melting, and the resulting rising waters may put major coastal cities under water. The protective atmosphere is slowly disappearing.  The fire pits in my neighborhood are blazing ten feet high, and I cannot open my windows or go outside because of the smoke pollution!

I am not smart enough to know who is right about global warming.

My fear is, what if global warming is true?  If we let it get worse, will we be able to reverse the damage?

JOSEPH HAGEDORN

Sep. 4, 2011, 11:44 a.m.

Joseph G. Hagedorn

Allowing interest rates to rise will give retirees and others a lot more money to spend on consumption and create 1-2 million jobs, maybe more.  Hopefully, we will not be afraid to spend like we are now.  The low interest rate policy of the Federal Reserve has not created much expansion in the economy.  It has not worked.

Obama’s jobs plan will help a lot of laid off people, but it may not develop into a permanent thing.  When the funds and construction, etc. stop, the jobs go away and we may be worse off from the huge additional U.S debt created.  The current 20% unemployment rate is getting closer to the 25% unemployment of the Great Depression.  Many people feel that the Great Recession is really another Great Depression.  What would have happened if we did not have economic safety nets?  Revolution?

As Mr. Mauldin says, before things get better, the entire economy needs to be restructured (deleveraged), which may take a long time.  Everything is way over priced.  I keep getting these home improvement offers of half price, $80.00 or more for only $40.00 an hour.  What a joke!  Then I find out they only work about four to five hours a day.  Your lucky if they show up by 10 or 11 AM, and they are getting ready to leave by 2 or 3 PM.

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