This is from my friend Rich Yamarone at Bloomberg. He listens to 100s of corporate calls a quarter and summarizes what he hears. You can see if a company you follow is on this month's list in the index. Want to know how the economy is really doing? Here it is – no data or surveys. The real rubber-meets-the-road stuff, or at least what the C-suite guys see. "Just sending along the latest (complete) QII Bloomberg Orange Book ... you can see the continued fears of retailers, restaurants, food companies, and grocery stores. There is a great reluctance to pass along higher input/commodity prices. The basic material companies (the source of much of that inflation) are clearly pushing though higher raw materials prices. This looks like a real margin squeeze."