BRIEFS

There's the old saw about don't do as I do but do as I say. 

Some think that's what Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke should do, especially now that the unemployment rate has dropped to 7.5% and many folks seem to be cheering.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887323296504578394242752505924.html?mod=WSJ_Opinion_LEFTTopOpinion

Speaking of jobs, this morning's report surprised with 165,000 new jobs in April versus an expected 140,000.

But as CNN reported the bigger story was the Bureau of Labor's revision of those abysmal March numbers. The BLS now says 138,000 jobs were added in March, 50,000 more than the 88,000 originally announced.

As if that weren't enough spike for the economcic-recovery-punch bowl, the BLS added more jobs to their February count, claiming 332,000 jobs came on board.

So much for a spring slowdown is how some cheerleaders view it. Only time will tell.
http://money.cnn.com/2013/05/03/news/economy/april-jobs-report/index.html

For the sake of some semblance of balance here's another side, perhaps a not so rosy one, to those job numbers.
http://www.marketwatch.com/story/dark-side-to-jobs-report-big-drop-in-hours-worked-2013-05-03

THURSDAY READS

Shipping Next
http://www.cnbc.com/id/100697092

It's France, Jake.
http://www.testosteronepit.com/home/2013/5/1/the-french-governments-exquisite-bullying.html

Skill Over Rated
http://blogs.marketwatch.com/thetell/2013/05/01/words-of-wisdom-from-investment-guru-howard-marks/

Prices Never Drop
http://www.financialsense.com/contributors/michael-shedlock/here-we-go-again-builders-hold

Blame Game
http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2013/may/01/federal-reserve-congress-cuts-policy

First One Then Another
http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/05/01/us-usa-fiscal-defense-idUSBRE94016S20130501

WEDNESDAY READS

What's In It?
http://www.medhelp.org/nutrition/slideshows/Nutrition-Labels-101-How-to-Evaluate-Packaged-Foods/825/1

Another View
http://investorplace.com/2013/05/3-canadian-stocks-worth-buying/

1700 By Halloween? http://www.marketwatch.com/story/sp-500-will-be-at-1700-on-halloween-2013-05-01

Hard To Find
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887323798104578455192845985954.html?mod=ITP_pageone_0

Fed Sits Tight
http://www.cnbc.com/id/100695681

Haircut Warning From Bill Gross
http://money.cnn.com/2013/05/01/investing/pimco-gross-bull/index.html

Spanish Debt Buyers: A Look
http://www.marctomarket.com/2013/05/another-look-at-who-has-been-buying.html#more

ECONOMIC POLITICS

Economics is about far more than numbers and graphs.

More often than not it's about politics. The big debate about fiscal rectitude and high levels of debt brought out the "political gottcha corp," this time on the left.

The huge focus on a spreadsheet error, very common occurrences, didn't really change the basic fact of the study: big debt slows growth.

Common sense tells one that. What it doesn't tell is what's the magic number or ratio. The normal human temperature is 98.6 with slight variation up and down. 

Hang around an ER and you'll see some temps of 102 or 103-plus even. Do they all die? Absolutely not. But all get treated.

http://gregmankiw.blogspot.com/2013/04/stevenson-wolfers-on-reinhart-rogoff.html

ECONOMIC SNAPSHOT

A friend toils on the workman's compensation side of medicine. He's been doing it for nearly three decades.

For the unfamiliar WC is all about work-related injuries. When people are injured on the job their employer usually pays for work-related medical care. And a claim gets filed with the state and insurers.

Each state has its own regulations and each state is different. But it's big business that involves essentially the public trough, a place where many sup, perhaps not the least of whom are PI or personal injury attorneys.

Drive into or out of just about any airport in America and you'll see the billboards. On the rare chance you miss them there, check out late night infomercials and talk radio. Vultures can smell decay. 

My friend though he owns three clinics is a mom-and-popper in a declining mon-and-popper industry that's being swallowed whole by big conglomerates. Just like Costco and Walmart in retail to farming and pharmacies like CVS and Walgreens to you name it, the genie is out of the neighborhood bottle.

It's a big, cold, indifferent business despite the marketing. Vultures can also smell money. But we'll leave that for another time.

Besides worker-related injuries most of these clinics do other tasks like pre-employment physical exams and drug screens and even urgent care to a degree. In some ways they are far more sensitive to changes in the economic landscape than all the economists with all their econometric minutiae together.

Pre-employment physicals have to do with jobs. And the number fluctuates not only with the seasons but the times. Even drugs screens are a decent economic indicator. A positive test usually results in a non-hire, especially in harder times like now.

But before the recession when the economy was percolating things were so tight employers were hiring applicants with positive tests. They needed bodies. In short it's a cycle. 

The other neat feature is one gets to talk to lots of business owners, large and small. It's an informal survey, a snapshot, but it's much closer to where the surf and the sand unite than econometric models.

During good times work-related injuries usually increase. And foot traffic, not unlike, say, retail, tends to decrease during slower periods. It probably makes too much common sense for the cognoscenti.

And besides it's much more difficult for them and MSM to manipulate.

TUESDAY READS

Shareholder Pressure At Oxy
http://labusinessjournal.com/news/2013/apr/29/oxy-board-moves-retain-chazen-ceo/

Japanese Household Spending Up
http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/04/30/us-japan-economy-idUSBRE93T03R20130430

Flight Taxes
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887323528404578452851588518618.html?mod=WSJ_Opinion_AboveLEFTTop

Fashion Truck In Your Future http://www.ksdk.com/news/article/377354/3/City-forces-new-fashion-truck-off-streets-of-St-Louis

Solar Future http://www.minyanville.com/business-news/markets/articles/Chart-of-the-Day253A-Internet-Then/4/29/2013/id/49537

Dr. Doom Speaks http://money.cnn.com/2013/04/29/investing/roubini-stocks/index.html

This Is How Much They Hate Austerity
http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/economics-blog/2013/apr/29/austerity-kills-health-europe-us

Hidden Debt
http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/04/29/us-emerging-private-debt-idUSBRE93S0HV20130429

Facebook Versus Twitter
http://www.fool.com/investing/general/2013/04/24/twitter-is-aiming-for-facebooks-crown.aspx

MUCHO UNCERTAINTY

Some people, God bless 'em, you just got to love.

Bill McNabb, the CEO of Vanguard Group, is one of them. In a WSJ Opinion piece today after listing a litany of uncertainties vexing economic recovery--"regulatory policy, uncertainty about monetary policy, uncertainty about foreign policy, uncertainty about U.S. fiscal policy and the national debt," concludes his piece with this paragraph:

The good news is that if reform is enacted, and the costly pall of uncertainty is lifted, the U.S. economy has the potential to bounce back, creating the growth and jobs that are so badly needed. I am confident that our leaders in Washington can make it happen.

That's a lot of uncertainty to begin with. And you gotta love the qualifiers. Such uncertainty he goes on to say Vanguard estimates " has created a $261 billion drag on the U.S. economy." 

He could've been a bit more sanguine and rounded up the number at $260 billion.

Every time Congress fails to resolve one of these issues, McNabb claims his firm receives a variety of questions like how it affects their retirements to should they just put their money in a mattress.

Anyone care to hazard how McNabb answers this last one?

BRIEFS

Here's one of the hidden costs that increase the cost of health care bureaucrats and politicians don't want to tell you about: pushy attorneys, a legal system out of control and time demands, to name a few.

Of note is this comes from a Canadian practitioner, not some so-called greedy American doctor, where the health care system is supposed to be like my old girlfriend--so good and so fine.

http://boards.medscape.com/forums?128@708.Di81agmIflw@.2a3555a6!comment=1&cat=All

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It's time to tell them what we want. We hate to keep bringing up the airport mess, but it's relevant. One of the basic characteristics of humans is they will expand their power to the maximum given the leaway. 

Over the years the more power you give up to politicians and bureaucrats, the more they will seek to maximize that power by a factor of three. Forget party labels; that's all political BS. One of the anti-fiscal responsibility arguments centers on the political party BS. It's a sham.

Both of these groups are about one thing--self-perpetuation.

http://www.wallstreetinsightsandindictments.com/2013/04/the-tbtf-act-just-revived-the-spirit-of-glass-steagall/    

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ONE SIDE OF THE BOAT

One side of the boat is starting to fill up.

The name of the vessel could easily be: "Could Persist For Years." That's becoming the mantra it appears for more and more money mangers quoted in financial pages. The reference is to Ben Bernanke and the Fed's next-to-zero interest rate scheme.

And a scheme is what it is, though in the British vernacular the terms carries less questionable baggage. We prefer the good old American usage, as in up to tomfoolery.

Much of this sentiment comes from the belief there's no inflation, a point of view that could turn out to be one of the biggest lies ever told. But we'll leave that for later. If the golden rule is those who hold the gold make the rules, the same holds for the CPI.

Check out chained CPI. It might be playing at a venue near you soon if certain people get their way. Without getting into a rant, the chained CPI is like the air traffic controller mess. You deserve it if you stand for it.

Dividends historically have played a large part in total return, more so at some times than others.  We like dividends as well as the next fella. What we don't like is the double taxation, a government scheme in the best American usage of the term. 

Again it's a question of whom do you believe. During the tech stock mania, those stocks represented a big percentage of the S&P 500 value. Same case when energy stocks soared.  

Somehow these things usually find their way back to the mean.

MONDAY READS

Iranian Sanctions http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/04/29/iran-sanctions-palmoil-idUSL4N0BZ44W20130429

Trouble In Luxembourg
http://www.testosteronepit.com/home/2013/4/26/luxembourg-is-not-the-next-cyprus-not-yet-but.html

Dollar-Yen Top? http://www.cnbc.com/id/100682468

Inside Syria
http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/04/28/us-syria-crisis-life-insight-idUSBRE93R02K20130428

Feeling The Slowdown
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887323798104578450660680338312.html?mod=ITP_pageone_0

Data Versus Earnings
http://www.marketwatch.com/story/data-to-overtake-earnings-as-may-looms-2013-04-28

Spanish Unemployment
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2013/apr/28/spain-indignados-protests-state-of-mind


ECB Rate Cuts--When?
http://money.cnn.com/2013/04/29/news/economy/ecb-interest-rates/index.html

Pendulum May Be Swinging
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887323789704578446614144636002.html?mod=WSJ_hp_mostpop_read