Viewpoints: November 2020

"Actual" consumer price inflation is rising during the recession. That runs counter to the normal recessionary pattern when the combination of weak demand and excess capacity works to lessen inflationary pressures. The main source of [...]

The Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia's state coincident indexes in October were once again positive, but very mixed. 13 states saw increases of 10 percent or more in the three months since July, with Massachusetts once again way [...]

"Light at the end of the tunnel" is a phrase that will likely be deployed very frequently in the coming weeks. That's because of the news concerning several vaccines for COVID-19 which have clearly generated heightened hope that the [...]

State labor market data results in October were generally strong. 37 states had statistically significant drops in their unemployment rates from September to October, with Illinois’s 3.6 percentage-point drop being the largest. 8 [...]

Something missing. Federal withheld gross income tax receipts continue to post large declines, missing the rebound in employment and wage and salary income. One wonders if the weakness in gross federal income tax receipts is related [...]

The announcement this week concerning a potential vaccine for COVID-19 should be a game changer for the world economy. Financial markets have certainly greeted this news by pricing in a rosier global economic scenario (see figure 1 [...]

A watershed event in politics reflects a "fundamental shift" in the federal government's role in domestic economic, financial, and social affairs. Based on the unprecedented governmental actions already taken by Congress and the [...]