Tuesday, February 17, 2015

Seven Questions of the Day

Jeremy Siegel is at it again, bless his heart.

Four years ago he warned us about the Great American Bond Bubble. He told us that bond yields were far too low to protect us from rising interest rates. For the record, and using the best hindsight analysis this side of the Mississippi, we can clearly see four years of additional ZIRP have occurred. The rising interest rate environment failed to materialize. Big shocker. Fortunately, as he was warning I was buying. 2011 was one of the biggest bond trading years of my life. I backed up the truck on 30-year TIPS with intent to hold to maturity. Still holding! No complaints!

So what is this wizard of Wall Street saying now?

February 17, 2015
Siegel: Need better growth before rate hike

F#%*^ing hilarious! If we cannot get the kind of growth he needs to see with a rapidly falling unemployment rate then how can we ever get it? I have news for him. Growth probably won't be picking up once the unemployment rate can fall no further. That should be obvious to all. I therefore offer the following as my questions of the day.

1. What is the true value of a Wharton School Economics degree?
2. Why does Jeremy Siegel appear so often on CNBC?
3. Can every Wharton School graduate expect to appear on CNBC?
4. If not, will Starbucks be hiring?
5. How much additional training will that require?
6. Will coffee prepared by an Ivy League barista taste any better?
7. How much longer will the era of economic sarcasm last?

7 comments:

Anonymous said...

Re: How much longer will the era of economic sarcasm last?

I know, I KNOW!!!

Until humans stop believing economic bullshit?

Stagflationary Mark said...

Anonymous,

The era of economic sarcasm rests on hope and change.

The change is trapped in the couch and the hope is that there will be enough of it to make the mortgage payment, lol. Sigh.

Bad Mark! Bad! Bad! ;)

mab said...

7. How much longer will the era of economic sarcasm last?

Nothing is over until we say it's over! Was it over when the Germans bombed Pearl harbor?......

Oh wait, that's from Animal House, I was thinking of Animal Farm

Stagflationary Mark said...

mab,

The farm?

Lack of respect, wrong attitude, failure to obey authority.

Oh, wait. That's a Boy and His Dog.

Troy said...

"Growth probably won't be picking up once the unemployment rate can fall no further."

we're still a bit away from that point, looking at FTE:

http://research.stlouisfed.org/fred2/graph/?g=11An

tells me 1999 is still 5+ years out

Troy said...

hmm the age 15-64 population is not going down, either:

http://i.imgur.com/8swtlTl.png

Stagflationary Mark said...

Troy,

We aren't going to make it back to 1999 imho.