jhalada, I did not mean to nitpick. I'm just trying not to let this thread get political - I accept that the NYT leans towards the Democrats in the editorial opinion, but I find their reporting of facts still to be second to none (despite their well publicized recent mishaps - reported so widely because it is so atypical for them).
Now, what growth rate would I find acceptable? I don't trust growth rates. Let me give a little background for my thinking:
My direct memory of economic data goes back to the 1960s. In the 1960s and 1970s economic data collection and reporting was a nonpartisan effort with the various agencies given freedom to come up with accurate definitions and measures.
The first political messing with the numbers that I recall came in the 1980s when the government took housing costs out of the consumer price index. (The rationale was that consumers don't buy a house every year, conveniently ignoring a couple of facts - first, renters pay more rent according to housing inflation; second, the average home owner buys a house every 7 years so is massively impacted by housing inflation). The result is that the most inflationary part of the economy was no longer reflected in the consumer price index.
Things have gotten steadily worse since then. The public understood that in 1992 when the punished GHW Bush for a recession - six months after the stats showed the economy was growing! The growth rate had been perverted beyond meaning by then. (Of course, on the corporate side, P&L is distorted to be almost meaningless. It is a societal trend.)
I look towards quality job creation and total non-farm payrolls as the best indicator of economic health. They are the most accurate indicators around. I do not see the current situation as healthy - we lost many $120,000 jobs in the last recession and now we are suppose to get excited that they are replaced by $30,000 service jobs? (That does not even count the fact that the most widly optimistic job creation scenerios have the number of jobs equaling what they were in January, 2001 come next January, 2005 - all this in a growing labor market!)
This is not a political statement. There are many reasons we vote for President - economy, peace vs. war, security and defense, moral issues, spending priorities, etc. Also, I note that the Clinton administration did nothing to fix the highly compromised economic stats we have, which exaggerated the economic boom of the 90s to his benefit (and fueled the bubble).
I'm just simply pointing out that this economy does not show the profile of past economic recoveries, and an astute investor should take that into consideration when making investment decisions.
Once again, I note that the stock market as a whole is showing similar misgivings as I have noted, although the market does not collectively explain its reasons.
AI
