“OMB Director Mulvaney cites a record high in gov’t revenue. True, revenues hit a high in nominal terms over FY18, growing 0.4% Y/Y, However after adjusting for inflation, growth actually fell by 1.6%”.
Steve Rattner
“Non Farm Payrolls puffed up all year, major negative adjustment to come later. For most Americans this is not a strong economy, regardless of what Fed or Administration says. When the jobs data is benchmarked to the tax data in February, there will be a massive downward revision.
I just ran the October withholding, and there is no way that this number is correct. Withholding was extremely weak. Bureau of Labor Statistics overstating gains all year.”
Lee Adler, Capital Stool
“Thanks [Lee] for the insight on the inconsistency of NFP with payroll withholding. I was about to have a quick look at tax receipts but you saved me from that task. As for avg wages rising I expect much wage gains concentration in top 10% (supervisory), similarly for per capita incomes… [for a truer picture look at median numbers especially in times of record income disparity]
BLS says 250,000 jobs created. Zero attention to how number compiled. BLS number helped each month by “birth-death” ESTIMATE to account for unknown business shutdowns and startups. Guess what? The Birth-death estimate this time was +246,000. Good NFP before midterms.”
Harald Malmgren
Most who frequent TBP know that official statistics on the economy are bullshit. Of course, MSM cites them as fact, but so do most alternative news sites. Zerohedge, a year ago or so, posted an article that proved beyond any doubt that GDP figures are nonsense because they include government debt (bonds). As the article said, that’s exactly like considering a Mastercard bill as income. Take out this debt and GDP has been falling in the USA by an average of 7.5% a year since 2008! And it’s even worse than that when we consider the government understates inflation, which is used in the calculation of change in real GDP. Yet, every month, Zerohedge cites the government GDP figure, as does everyone else. We’ve been in a massive depression since 2008, and not even the otherwise awake (woke*) alternative news readers have any clue about it.
*The “woke” business gets me. Changing the past tense of a verb into an adjective that means essentially the same thing as awake. For what? To save one letter or one syllable? To show one is fashionable? Whoever came up with it showed a distinct lack of imagination, and those who repeat it show even less.
The economy is as strong as the ill-educated masses are led to believe it is. They spend half of their income on government mandated healthcare, half on housing, and put everything else on credit cards. They walk around with a smile for a 5% raise as the value of $1.00 heads to zero.
I guess ignorance truly is bliss, unless your not completely ignorant. Then, living in a world of idiots is just a hell unlike any other.
“Government revenue” is just another way of saying “MONEY THE GOVERNMENT STOLE FROM THE PRODUCTIVE SECTOR OF SOCIETY.” Never forget that. They don’t produce anything, sell anything, etc. in any voluntary market way. They just TAKE.