Post by unlawflcombatnt on Feb 1, 2008 18:05:24 GMT -6
from Yahoo News:
Details of economic news Friday
"
EMPLOYMENT
_Employers cut 17,000 jobs in January, the first such reduction in more than 4 years. As the labor force shrank, the unemployment rate declined to 4.9% from 5% in December....
MANUFACTURING
_The Institute for Supply Management said its manufacturing index rose to a reading of 50.7 in January, from a revised reading of 48.4 in the previous month. A reading above 50 indicates growth.
CONSTRUCTION SPENDING
_Construction spending fell by a record -2.6% in 2007, after a +5.3% increase in 2006....
For December, construction spending dropped -1.1%, the most in 15 months.
WALL STREET
_Stocks finished the day higher"
In other news, Exxon-Mobil's 2007 profits set an all-time record high of $40 billion.
Bill Gates of Microslime has bid $45 billion to purchase Yahoo.
And what's wrong with another mega-merger, and the complete monopolization of an industry? What's wrong with letting 1 giant Corporation control an entire industry? Isn't that what they call...umm..."economies of scale"? So wouldn't that make this an "economy-of-scale" benefit? Wouldn't it guarantee lower prices for consumers, since production costs are lowered through increased "efficiency?" Don't Corporations always pass cost savings on to consumers? Don't consumer prices always fall when 2 Corporate entitiescollude merge into an even larger mega-Corporation—giving them complete control of an entire market? Certainly they wouldn't take advantage of the lack of competion to raise prices, would they?
Of course not.
Bill Gates is a saint and everyone knows it. He'd never try to profiteer from monopolization of an entire industry. After all, he's never done anything like that in the past, has he? And Gates' desire to replace all high-skilled American IT workers with H1B workers to reduce costs shouldn't be held against him. He's only trying to lower costs, and pass those cost savings on to American consumers.
Gates is only concerned about the wellbeing of his fellow Americans, not profits. His billionaire status is simply an accident, and he would readily give all his money back to the Americans he profiteered off of—but management and shareholders won't let him.
Returning to Friday's markets:
Most major stock indexes, both in the U.S. and abroad, skyrocketed at 10 AM EST. The FTSE (Britain), DAX (Germany), and the CAC (France) rose sharply at 10 AM EST.
The same was true in the U.S. The sharpest 10 AM increases came from Commericial banks and GSEs (Fannie Mae & Freddie Mac). At the same time, prices of Gold and Silver fell off a cliff. It appears markets do everything possible to discount bad economic news, and use even the slightest positive news to support a bullish assessment of the overall economy.
As long as the Corporate plutocracy is doing well, even if only temporarily, the stock market will rise—even when most macro numbers are bad. Even, it appears, when they are near catastrophic.
Details of economic news Friday
"
EMPLOYMENT
_Employers cut 17,000 jobs in January, the first such reduction in more than 4 years. As the labor force shrank, the unemployment rate declined to 4.9% from 5% in December....
MANUFACTURING
_The Institute for Supply Management said its manufacturing index rose to a reading of 50.7 in January, from a revised reading of 48.4 in the previous month. A reading above 50 indicates growth.
CONSTRUCTION SPENDING
_Construction spending fell by a record -2.6% in 2007, after a +5.3% increase in 2006....
For December, construction spending dropped -1.1%, the most in 15 months.
WALL STREET
_Stocks finished the day higher"
In other news, Exxon-Mobil's 2007 profits set an all-time record high of $40 billion.
Bill Gates of Microslime has bid $45 billion to purchase Yahoo.
And what's wrong with another mega-merger, and the complete monopolization of an industry? What's wrong with letting 1 giant Corporation control an entire industry? Isn't that what they call...umm..."economies of scale"? So wouldn't that make this an "economy-of-scale" benefit? Wouldn't it guarantee lower prices for consumers, since production costs are lowered through increased "efficiency?" Don't Corporations always pass cost savings on to consumers? Don't consumer prices always fall when 2 Corporate entities
Of course not.
Bill Gates is a saint and everyone knows it. He'd never try to profiteer from monopolization of an entire industry. After all, he's never done anything like that in the past, has he? And Gates' desire to replace all high-skilled American IT workers with H1B workers to reduce costs shouldn't be held against him. He's only trying to lower costs, and pass those cost savings on to American consumers.
Gates is only concerned about the wellbeing of his fellow Americans, not profits. His billionaire status is simply an accident, and he would readily give all his money back to the Americans he profiteered off of—but management and shareholders won't let him.
Returning to Friday's markets:
Most major stock indexes, both in the U.S. and abroad, skyrocketed at 10 AM EST. The FTSE (Britain), DAX (Germany), and the CAC (France) rose sharply at 10 AM EST.
The same was true in the U.S. The sharpest 10 AM increases came from Commericial banks and GSEs (Fannie Mae & Freddie Mac). At the same time, prices of Gold and Silver fell off a cliff. It appears markets do everything possible to discount bad economic news, and use even the slightest positive news to support a bullish assessment of the overall economy.
As long as the Corporate plutocracy is doing well, even if only temporarily, the stock market will rise—even when most macro numbers are bad. Even, it appears, when they are near catastrophic.