Saturday, October 20, 2012

The $10,000 Line of Death


Click to enlarge.

No Man's Land

No man's land is a term for land that is unoccupied or is under dispute between parties that leave it unoccupied due to fear or uncertainty. The term was originally used to define a contested territory or a dumping ground for refuse between fiefdoms. It is most commonly associated with the First World War to describe the area of land between two enemy trenches to which neither side wished to move openly or to seize due to fear of being attacked by the enemy in the process.

Source Data:
St. Louis Fed: Custom Chart

6 comments:

Stagflationary Mark said...

We made it $2,012 into no man's land during the last recession.

Too bad the recession officially began just $706 in. Seriously.

TJandTheBear said...

Now THAT's a fascinating and thoroughly original chart (at least to me).

Any theories on why we broke the trend in the 70's? Nixon closed the gold window, energy dependence, ???

dearieme said...

In the figure title it says "real": is that a reference to it all being inflation-corrected (i.e. being in Sept 2012 dollars)?

Stagflationary Mark said...

TJandTheBear,

In 1975, we thought we'd have a moonbase by 1999. We sure showed them!

In all seriousness, I suspect that this chart has something to do with it. It shows manufacturing employment divided by civilian employment.

If we hollow out manufacturing, then we probably don't need as many industrial loans.

Just a thought.

Stagflationary Mark said...

dearieme,

Yes. Generally speaking, when I use the word "real" I mean that it is adjusted for inflation.

Real versus nominal value (economics)

Stagflationary Mark said...

From Hero to Zero

The chart shows the manufacturing employment trend.