Its improving...
12 June 2013
...the economy I mean.....
...the economy I mean.....
A lot of very positive numbers have been released over the last couple of weeks that re-reinforce the view that economic recovery is getting firmly established.
Growth has been reported in every economic sector, the housing market is improving, exports to outside the EU are up by 11%.....
The only blackspot is exports to the ailing Eurozone, down 1.5%.
Even more people are reporting increased disposable income. The City AM chart below illustrates this.
There remain a lot of challenges ahead though and it is no time for the government to sit back. Recovery remains too slow and action is still required to reduce further the burden of taxes and red tape on business. Nothing yet has been done either about our over-complex and too high taxes.
Nevertheless at least we are getting firmly onto that road to recovery.
- interesting that exports to countries outside the european union are growing, shows some get up and go from our exporters and also proves the adage about not putting all of ones eggs in one basket.
- "Wage cuts for British workers deepest since records began, IFS shows"
"Describing this downturn as the longest and deepest slump in a century, the Institute for Fiscal Studies says workers have suffered unprecedented pay cuts of 6% in real terms over the last five years.
Historically, real wages rise by about 2% a year. This suggests that people are more than 15% worse off than they would have been if the pre-crisis wage trends had continued.
Analysing downturns going back to the great depression, Paul Johnson, director of the IFS, said: "This time really does seem to be different … it has been deeper and longer than those of the 1990s, the 1980s and even the 1930s. It has seen household incomes and spending drop more and stay lower longer."..."
"...Official figures on Tuesday brought little comfort for ministers looking for a manufacturing revival to turn the tide on productivity. Hopes that a pick-up in industry would lead to better balanced growth in the UK were dented by data for April showing the first decline in factory production in three months.
The Office for National Statistics said factories were producing 10% less than they were in 2007, before the onset of the recession in early 2008.
David Kern, chief economist at the British Chambers of Commerce, said: "Our manufacturing exporters are still overly focused on the weak eurozone, but low domestic demand has also limited progress."
The service sector was facing its own challenges from demand being sucked out of the economy by the squeeze on wages, economists warned.
"This period has seen the biggest squeeze of real pay in decades," said Michael Pearce, at Capital Economics. "We're not expecting this damage [to households' real pay] to be reversed any time soon, highlighting one reason not to get too carried away by recent signs of economic recovery."..."
http://www.guardian.co.uk/money/2013/jun/12/workers-deepest-cuts-real-wages-ifs - That's all good, Tom, because it shows that people have accepted a cut in their standard of living. This was well overdue. Real wages cannot go on rising in a slack economy unless we want to end up with Greek unemployment levels.
- The Grauniad!!! You should know better Tom - of course they will try to find the most negative spin in figures through date manipulation. For instance, yes of course if you take the trend on income before the economic slowdown started in 2007 and project that forward you will have a significant reduction, that goes without saying. This was inevitable after years of a government keeping the economy on going on a bubble of unsustainable debt through artificially low interest rates. The pre-2007 trend figures were therefore a mirage and reality has now asserted itself.
That same comparison is true of the other items highlighted below compared to 2007 when the whole economy and so called growth since 2000 was based on an unsustainable bubble.
We have seen a massive economic correction the scale of which mirrors the scale of the economic delusion most people were under in 2007. A more sensible and prudent fiscal and monetary policy from 2000 would have meant a much less severe correction now.
I note that you (or perhaps the Grauniad) are very selective on reporting what the IFS says. Nothing about how further public spending cuts are essential and too little too slow has been done, exactly what I have been saying.
Anyway lets be positive, there is a lot to be positive about.
The trade figures I referred to above: http://www.thetimes.co.uk/tto/business/economics/article3785927.ece?CMP=OTH-gnws-standard-2013_06_07
http://www.express.co.uk/news/uk/405985/Proof-Britain-doesn-t-need-EU-our-trade-with-rest-of-the-world-is-now-booming
Construction sector growth:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-22768282
Services and industrial sector growth
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/economics/10113389/UK-services-sector-to-drive-growth-in-2013-says-NIESR.html
Even Liverpool and the North West are picking up:
http://www.liverpooldailypost.co.uk/ldpbusiness/business-local/2013/06/10/private-sector-growth-picks-up-99623-33449263/
How about jobs....
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/jobs/10115141/UK-employment-at-record-high-as-more-pensioners-stay-in-work.html
That will do for now.... Tom, there is every reason to cheer up. - By all means, let us ignore the -15% figure and stick with the -6% figure.
I do not set out to cheer (myself or any other) only to push from the other end, so that we may end up somewhere in the middle with a more clear understanding of our Nation's economy. Admittedly this leads to confusion as we see that at one and the same time people have more and less money to spend.
As with all figures set out as percentages; for a wage of £100 a 6% loss merely knocks one packet of crisps from the weekly shop for the balance to be reset, and this may only apply to Barry's 15% who struggle in any case.
For the other 85%, not only would -6% mean more of a loss, but what proportion of these is subject to such a loss? And if any could be found, it is plain to see that they are handling things well, discovering more and more disposable income. Apparently.
Whatever one quotes from the IFS, it is a quote.
It is odder still that improvements can be cheerily highlighted when much of the population has less to spend (full stop) and the rest spend less to save more, odd unless you perceive yourself to be the centre of all things. As ever the Devil will be in the detail...and we seem happy to do without any of that. - Tom, sometimes I think that if Barry said that grass is green and the sky is blue, you would find a counter-proposition.
- "Statistically speaking, politicians place too much faith in figures."
From Fraser Nelson...
"A few years ago, the Office of National Statistics revealed that 31 per cent of people don’t believe its statistics. Even this figure is probably wrong. The economists’ world is one of educated guesstimates that are usually revised later; they only ever use the decimal point to show that they have a sense of humour. The boffins know, better than anyone, that most statistics are fallible. But this is seldom appreciated by politicians, who crave certainty and love setting targets. In theory, metrics should be tools to help government. In practice, Big Data is slowly taking over. .."
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/10118371/Statistically-speaking-politicians-place-too-much-faith-in-figures.html