Ward on Words

WSJ covers the emerging green shoots of the economy - the unemployment rate is dropping, as are the new claims for unemployment. Kinda looking like THIS drop in unemployment is for real, not just the "fuzzy math" that comes by not counting people who've given up all hope of ever getting a job. Can it be that years after Ben Bernanke so optimistically groomed us for "green shoots," they're finally popping up at last?! Well, according to the WSJ, the Fed's not doing a jig just yet: "The Federal Reserve, charged with maintaining stable prices and maximum employment, has remained cautious." Strange to see such caution from an organization that proclaimed the arrival of [the false] spring back in March 2009...

Just weeks ago, we were heralding the arrival of the green shoots - the recovery, we were told, was blooming alongside of spring. So it seemed a short time ago. Today, while the lilacs bloom all around me (reminding me of Whitman - and of Lincoln), it seems the green shoots of recovery are withering on the vine. With Memorial Day - the official start of summer - still in the not-so-distant future, gas prices in my area have jumped up more than fifty cents in the last week or so. (One imagines what the price of gas will be like in July - and one remembers the impact the price of gas had on consumer spending last summer.) And even before gas prices began to go up, consumers had begun to hang on to their money - according to a story in the Wall Street Journal, the April retail season was not abloom with spending. In fact it was the second month in a row to post declines in retail spending. Here's to hoping that those folks getting the bonuses will start spending like mad...