CHESSNOID

It’s hard to tell what information is real and what is manipulated coming out from our government agencies.  Is the economy getting better or worse?  Reports seem to be contradicting each other, but that just depends on how you interpret them.

The number of banks closed last year and taken over by the FDIC in 2009 were 140.  There are many more problem banks remaining that probably should be closed but won’t be.  This year we begin with our first bank and credit union closings.  Wall Street Journal:

Regulators seized a small bank and a tiny credit union, the first two failures in a year that is expected to bring the collapse of many more financial institutions reeling from the economic downturn and other woes.

The Washington State Department of Financial Institutions closed Horizon Bank, an 18-branch bank based in Bellingham, Wash. Its $1.1 billion of deposits and nearly all of its $1.3 billion assets were assumed by Washington Federal Savings and Loan Association, of Seattle.

Washington Federal didn’t pay a premium to assume the deposits. It also entered into a loss-sharing agreement with the Federal Insurance Deposit Corp. on roughly $1 billion of Horizon’s assets.

The FDIC estimates that the collapse of Horizon will cost the agency’s deposit-insurance fund $539.1 million. Like many small U.S. banks, Horizon was hobbled by bad real-estate loans.

The number of bank failures should go down since we are “technically” in a recovery phase and the recession is “officially” over.  Let us wait and see if the bank failures surpass the number in 2009.  Technically it should not based on what government economists say.  So I wonder, are bank failures leading or lagging economic indicators?  The government economists stated that unemployment rates are lagging indicators.  Of course, they are trying to base that theory on history.  Is it consistently right?  No.  But they will use it to put a nice spin on a bad economy.

As far as the manipulated reports, I am referring to the job losses. We had job losses but the unemployment rate didn’t go up because those people who gave up looking are not counted. Is that convenient or what? We have a number that can’t be accounted for but used to show the rate of unemployment didn’t go up.

Jan. 9 (Bloomberg) Shrinking U.S. Labor Force Keeps Unemployment Rate From Rising —

An exodus of discouraged workers from the job market kept the U.S. unemployment rate from climbing above 10 percent in December, economists said.

Had the labor force not decreased by 661,000 last month, the jobless rate would have been 10.4 percent, according to economists including David Rosenberg at Gluskin Sheff & Associates in Toronto and Harm Bandholz at UniCredit Research in New York.

“The actual unemployment rate is higher than shown by the official numbers,” Bandholz said yesterday after a Labor Department report released in Washington showed the economy unexpectedly lost 85,000 jobs in December while the jobless rate was unchanged.

About 1.7 million Americans opted out of the workforce from July through December, representing a 1.1 percent drop that marks the biggest six-month decrease since 1961, the Labor Department report showed. The share of the population in the labor force last month fell to the lowest level in 24 years.

December’s 10 percent unemployment rate matched the median forecast of economists surveyed by Bloomberg News. It was shy of the 26-year high of 10.1 percent reached two months earlier.

The so-called underemployment rate — which includes part- time workers who’d prefer a full-time position and people who want work but have given up looking — rose to 17.3 percent in December from 17.2 percent.

The number of discouraged workers, those not looking for work because they believe none is available, climbed to 929,000 last month, the most since records began in 1994.

I do wonder who actually counts these 929,000 people who simply became discouraged and stopped looking.   I believe the number is much higher and that there is no real or accurate way to keep track of these people.  Just look at the title of the Bloomberg article which is utter nonsense, propaganda, or both.

Do you still believe the government has created 3 or 4 million jobs from that last stimulus bill that WASTED our tax money?  If you do, then you might want to open your eyes.  There are more businesses closing than opening, there are still more foreclosures than sales, and most states are in the red when it comes to their budgets.  This means that large populous states like California and New York will need some Federal Bailout money to balance their budget shortfalls, or cut programs and jobs.