Robert Brusca
Robert Brusca
aware energy people prices
People are aware of what energy prices are doing to their pocketbooks, and their company,
bigger deficit forecast foreign growth lower oil prices reasons relatively seems trade weak
The trade deficit seems to only get bigger and never recede. The reasons are clear, oil prices are up, foreign growth is still relatively weak and US growth is strong. There is no reason to forecast a lower deficit.
decline demand prices slack unless
Prices don't decline like this unless you've got a lot of slack demand conditions.
chasing few inflation money oil prices
Oil prices going up is not inflationary. Inflation is too much money chasing too few goods.
across areas broad concerned core declines fed growth inflation percent prices reason spectrum
Inflation decelerated across a broad spectrum of core CPI areas -- about 40 percent of prices in the core showed declines in their year-over-year growth rate. That's a big proportion. The Fed is concerned and has a reason to be concerned.
consumer control prices
consumer prices are really going to be under control, as well.
compensate energy eventually fact itself month period prices work works
Eventually you have other prices going down to compensate for the fact that energy went up. But that doesn't work itself out in a month or two; it works out over a period of time.
decline demand economy economy-and-economics prices shows slack unless weak
These are big declines. It shows you how weak the economy is. Prices don't decline like this unless you've got slack demand conditions.
fed limits slower suggest
I think we're going to have a slower recovery, ... There are other things that suggest there are limits to what the Fed can do.
challenge control danger history lessons party
I think that one of the lessons in history is that if any party has too much control, the danger is that they will go overboard. The challenge for this administration is going to be to keep control of things.
consumer economy equity everybody happy housing increase negative partly people performance pull quite savings spending supported
While everybody is very happy with the performance of the economy under Greenspan, it's come at quite a price. We have a negative savings rate. The consumer has been out spending his and her income, partly supported by an increase in housing prices, where people had to pull a lot of the equity out of their home. Well they can't do that again.
bit consumer growth highly linking output spending
While consumer spending has sparked up a bit recently, linking it to better output growth is still highly speculative.
concerns continues evidence fears inflation
While concerns about inflation swirl, the evidence continues to give those fears little substance,
against maybe reason suggesting
We have a lot of things suggesting that maybe things have improved, ... I don't see any reason to go against the numbers.