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From The Economic Collapse

On Friday, the entire financial world celebrated when it was announced that the unemployment rate in the United States had fallen to 8.3 percent. That is the lowest it has been since February 2009, and it came as an unexpected surprise for financial markets that are hungry for some good news.  According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, nonfarm payrolls jumped by 243,000 during the month of January.  You can read the full employment report right here.  Based on this news, pundits all over the world were declaring that the U.S. economy is back.  Stocks continued to rise on Friday and the Dow is hovering near a 4 year high.  So does this mean that our economic problems are over?  Of course not.  A closer look at the numbers reveals just how fraudulent these employment statistics really are.  Between December 2011 and January 2012, the number of Americans “not in the labor force” increased by a whopping 1.2 million.  That was the largest increase ever in that category for a single month.  That is how the federal government is getting the unemployment rate to go down.  The government is simply pretending that huge numbers of unemployed Americans don’t want to be part of the labor force anymore.  As you will see below, the employment situation in America is not improving.  Yet everyone in the mainstream media is dancing…

From Mish’s Global Economic Trend Analysis

Shortly after Dutch finance minister, said “We want no further delays” came news of further delays. The reason: Greek political parties all refuse to go along with more austerity measures.

Please consider Greece’s leaders oppose new austerity measures

All three party leaders in Greece’s teetering national unity government have opposed new austerity measures demanded by international lenders, forcing eurozone finance ministers to postpone approval of a new €130bn bail-out and moving the country closer to a full-blown default.

Representatives of the so-called “troika” – the European Commission, European Central Bank and International Monetary Fund – have demanded further cuts in government jobs and severe reductions in Greek salaries, including an immediate 25 per cent cut in the €750 minimum monthly wage, before agreeing the new rescue.

But representatives of all three coalition partners, including centre-left Pasok of former prime minister George Papandreou and the centre-right New Democracy of likely successor Antonis Samaras, said they were unwilling to back the government layoffs.

In addition, a Greek government official said the EU and IMF negotiators rejected a counter-proposal that would have frozen Greek wages for three years and cut social security contributions by 10 per cent.

Finance ministers from the four remaining triple As – Germany, the Netherlands, Finland and Luxembourg – met in Berlin on Friday where they agreed that Athens must move quickly or they would withhold assistance.

“We want no further delays,” Jan Kees de Jager, the Dutch finance minister,

…

From The Market Ticker

Just as the market was starting to flag a bit on the NFP number here comes services ISM and blows out the bears’ teeth.

The report was issued today by Anthony Nieves, C.P.M., CFPM, chair of the Institute for Supply Management™ Non-Manufacturing Business Survey Committee. “The NMI registered 56.8 percent in January, 3.8 percentage points higher than the seasonally adjusted 53 percent registered in December, and indicating continued growth at a faster rate in the non-manufacturing sector. The Non-Manufacturing Business Activity Index registered 59.5 percent, which is 3.6 percentage points higher than the seasonally adjusted 55.9 percent reported in December, reflecting growth for the 30th consecutive month. The New Orders Index increased by 4.8 percentage points to 59.4 percent, and the Employment Index increased by 7.6 percentage points to 57.4 percent, indicating substantial growth in employment after one month of contraction. The Prices Index increased 1.5 percentage points to 63.5 percent, indicating prices increased at a slightly faster rate in January when compared to December. According to the NMI, 12 non-manufacturing industries reported growth in January. Respondents’ comments are mostly positive about business conditions. There is concern about cost pressures and the sustainability of the recent spike in activity.”

I’m surprised by this number – particularly the employment index, which is not congruent with the household survey.  In addition the prices number is trouble.

But it is what it is, and the market loved it (as expected with a beat…

From The Economic Collapse

The United Nations says that the earth is in great danger and that the way you and I are living is the problem.  In a shocking new report entitled, “Resilient People, Resilient Planet: A Future Worth Choosing” the UN declares that the entire way that we currently approach economics needs to be changed.  Instead of focusing on things like “economic growth”, the UN is encouraging nations all over the world to start basing measurements of economic success on the goal of achieving “sustainable development”.  But there is a huge problem with that.  The UN says that what we are doing right now is “unsustainable” by definition, and the major industrialized nations of the western world are the biggest culprits.  According to the UN, since we are the ones that create the most carbon emissions and the most pollution, we are the ones that should make the biggest sacrifices.  In addition, since we have the most money, we should also be willing to finance the transition of the developing world to a “sustainable development” economy as well.  As you will see detailed in the rest of this article, the United Nations basically wants to crash the world economy in order to save the environment.  Considering the fact that the U.S. and Europe are in the midst of a horrible economic crisis and are already drowning in debt, this…

From Mish’s Global Economic Trend Analysis

Quick Notes About the “Falling” Unemployment Rate

• In the last year, the civilian population rose by 3,565,000. Yet the labor force only rose by 1,145,000. Those not in the labor force rose by 2,420,000.

 

• In January, the Civilian Labor Force rose by 508,000.

 

• In January, those “Not in Labor Force” rose by an amazing 1,177,000. If you are not in the labor force, you are not counted as unemployed.

 

• Participation Rate fell .3 to 63.7%, taking out a 1984 low

 

• Were it not for people dropping out of the labor force, the unemployment rate would be well over 11%.

Some of those labor force numbers are due to annual revisions. However, the point remains: People are dropping out of the labor force at an astounding, almost unbelievable rate, holding the unemployment rate artificially low.

Jobs Report at a Glance

Here is an overview of today’s release.

• US Payrolls +243,000 – Establishment Survey
• US Unemployment Rate Declined .2  – Household Survey
• Average workweek for all employees on private nonfarm payrolls was +.1 to 34.4 hours
• The average workweek for production and nonsupervisory employees on private nonfarm payrolls edged higher 0.1 hour to 33.7 hours in November.
• Average hourly earnings for all employees in the private sector rose by 4 cents to $ 23.24

Recall that the unemployment rate varies…

From The Market Ticker

Here it comes!

NEW YORK – Attorney General Eric T. Schneiderman today filed a lawsuit against several of the nation’s largest banks charging that the creation and use of a private national mortgage electronic registry system known as MERS has resulted in a wide range of deceptive and fraudulent foreclosure filings in New York state and federal courts, harming homeowners and undermining the integrity of the judicial foreclosure process. The lawsuit asserts that employees and agents of Bank of America, J.P. Morgan Chase, and Wells Fargo, acting as “MERS certifying officers,” have repeatedly submitted court documents containing false and misleading information that made it appear that the foreclosing party had the authority to bring a case when in fact it may not have. The lawsuit names JPMorgan Chase Bank, N.A., Bank of America, N.A., Wells Fargo Bank, N.A., as well as Virginia-based MERSCORP, Inc. and its subsidiary, Mortgage Electronic Registration Systems, Inc.

The lawsuit further asserts that the MERS System has effectively eliminated homeowners’ and the public’s ability to track property transfers through the traditional public records system. Instead, this information is now stored only in a private database – which is plagued with inaccuracies and errors – over which MERS and its financial institution members exercise sole control. Additional defendants include BAC Home Loans Servicing, LP, Chase Home Finance LLC, EMC Mortgage Corporation, and Wells Fargo Home Mortgage, Inc.

“The banks created the MERS system as an end-run around the property

…

From Tactical Intelligence

I had the opportunity to get a preview copy of the first episode of the upcoming show called Doomsday Preppers which will be airing next Tuesday, February 7th on National Geographic.

I wanted to take a moment to give you guys an idea about what the show is about and what my initial thoughts and reactions are.

From the introduction scenes I immediately thought that NatGeo was going to put these preppers in a negative light which I’ve seen other shows do. To my surprise though I thought they did a great job at staying neutral and just documenting what these various preppers are doing if the SHTF.

The first episode documents three different groups of preppers from vastly different walks of life:

1. A group of 22 preppers from Texas with various skills (military, farming, homesteading etc) with plans of sheltering in a fortified compound capable of being completely off-grid and having 15 years of food storage for all 22 people.
2. A solo surivivalist in L.A. with plans of living off the land using mostly local plants, wildlife and his wilderness survival skills.
3. A young 20-something apartment-dwelling female from Houston who has enough supplies to last the initial 2 week chaos with plans to bug out to Mexico.

The basic outline of the show is as follows: Get a glimpse into the lives of each group of preppers, find out what they are preparing for, what types of preps they have,…

From What if IT is today? – A Survivalist’s Blog

Buying the "High dollar Items" may make you look cool, but that money is better put into food, supplies and barter goods. I run into many so called "preppers" who have tons of ammo, firearms and "cool stuff", yet their food storage is almost non-existent. They say they will "live of the land". My reply is do you know what plants you can eat and you can't? Do you know that a steady diet of meat will cause intestinal compaction, a bad form of constipation that will KILL YOU? For that matter, do you even have a stalking skill that will allow you to sneak up on animals that are even more wary because of increased hunting pressure?

Food storage is a NUMBER ONE priority. I always refer to the 5 "B" 's….Beans, Barter, Band aids, bullets and bullion. That should be the order of purchase.

I, personally have an old messenger bag/bandoleer behind my bedroom door. It has a first aid kit, magazines for my rifle and pistol, and extra ammo. This is my immediate response bag for fast defense. It cost me…

Apologies on the cut out part, but you didn’t miss much. Download the map! www.minecraftforum.net Follow me on twitter! twitter.com tags (ignore!) munch munchgamer minecraft survival notch mojang skyblock 1.1 forum minecraftforum.net cobble stone generator lava water floating platform custom map
Video Rating: 4 / 5

This is Season 2 of Man vs Minecraft, where I must survive alone for 14 days with hardcore rule set, including: * Permanent death! * Limited building! * No Healing! * More monsters! (Mo’ Creatures mod) * and more! Read the complete rules here: www.manvsminecraft.com Get Minecraft here: minecraft.net Music credits Ryan Johnson @ ryeguyhead.newgrounds.com Machinimasound @ www.machinimasound.com Jason Shaw @ http JewelBeat @ www.jewelbeat.com BLOG paulsoaresjr.com TWITTER twitter.com GOOGLE+: gplus.to YOUTUBE: www.youtube.com FAQ: www.youtube.com
Video Rating: 4 / 5

From Mish’s Global Economic Trend Analysis

Courtesy of a Barclays Capital email here are the latest unemployment numbers in Europe.

Euro Area: +0.2 to 10.4% based on slight upward revisions in November, September, August. This was the 8th consecutive rise.

• Austria 4.1% unchanged
• Belgium: 7.2% unchanged
• Finland 7.6% unchanged
• France 9.9% +0.1
• Germany: 5.5% -.1
• Italy 8.9% +0.1
• Ireland 14.5% +0.1
• Netherlands 4.9% unchanged
• Portugal 13.6% +0.4
• Slovakia: 13.4% -.1 to
• Spain 22.9% unchanged

Quarterly Perspective

From a quarterly perspective, the unemployment rate in Germany fell 0.2pp to 5.6% in Q4 (from Q3 – and -1.1pp from a year ago). Following the same trend, in Ireland, it has edged down from 14.5% to 14.4%.

France’s rose by another 0.1pp in Q4 11 to 9.8% after Q3 11 and is just 0.1pp above the 9.7% Q4 10 level; Italy’s rose 3 tenths in Q4 11 to 8.7%, now 0.5pp above Q4 10.

In the last quarter of the year, the situation in Portugal worsened particularly quickly as the unemployment rate rose 0.6pp to 13.3%, 1pp above Q4 10. In Spain, the situation deteriorated even quicker as the unemployment rate rose 7 tenths to 22.8% in Q4 11, 2.4pp above Q4 10 print.

Hiring Intentions

Barclays comments “We find that the overall picture is fairly negative and that it will not get any better in the short run. We expect the unemployment rate in the euro area to continue increasing…