Carter Country.

Gallup had a dose of good news and bad news for President Obama on Friday.  The good news?  His quarterly job approval rose about two and a half points over the previous quarter.  The bad news?  He’s trailing behind Jimmy Carter at the same point in their presidencies: President Obama’s job approval rating averaged 45.9% [...]

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Fell, rose ... who can tell?

As if the Obama administration didn’t have enough problems with economic indicators, the Department of Labor gave them another headache.  The upward spike two weeks ago in initial jobless claims doesn’t look like a fluke: In the week ending April 14, the advance figure for seasonally adjusted initial claims was 386,000, a decrease of 2,000 from the [...]

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An anthem.

Lila Rose is the founder of Live Action, a pro-life group that utilizes new media and investigative journalism to expose attacks on human life. She’s out today with an op-ed in Politico, “Battle Hymn of the Anti-Abortion Feminist.” I hope you’ll read the whole piece. In it, Rose introduces audiences to what she calls “the [...]

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The social safety hammock.

Flaunting food stamps almost seems to be a trend. First, Mr. EBT released his now-infamous rap. Shortly thereafter, girls followed suit with their own version. Now, a night club in Montgomery, Ala., is hosting its very own “Food Stamp Friday” party. On April 6, the Rose Supper Club in North Montgomery will offer a discounted [...]

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Blame.

“The National Debt has now increased more during President Obama’s three years and two months in office than it did during 8 years of the George W. Bush presidency. “The Debt rose $4.899 trillion during the two terms of the Bush presidency. It has now gone up $4.939 trillion since President Obama took office… “The [...]

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Bankruptcy filings rose in February, but the spike in filings keeps with historical trends. According to data from Epiq Systems, there were over 104,000 bankruptcies in February 2012. Spread over the 20 business days during the month, the daily February filing rate was 5,221 as compared to only 4,399 in January. This is a rise of 18.7% in one month, a matter of concern perhaps at first glance but no surprise on further analysis.

It seemed time to update a chart I have used in the past. The graph to the right shows month-to-month changes in the daily U.S. bankruptcy filing rate from 2008 through 2011. Late winter and early spring always see a spike in bankruptcy filing rates -- the cylicality persists even in previous years.

The graphs also show an amazingly consistent trend where the daily bankruptcy filing rate slowly erodes throughout the year. A simple regression on each year implies that the daily filing rate erodes an average of around 1.3% each month from its high in the early part of the year. This downward trend over the course of the year is true even in years like 2009 and 2010 when the total annual bankruptcy rate increased as compared to the previous year. Thus, when bankruptcy filings go up on an annual basis, the bulk of the increase comes in the early part of the year.

Looking at where we have started, it looks more like 2012 will see another decline in bankruptcy filings. Instead of an increase, bankruptcy filings continue to go down. On a year-over-year basis, the February 2012 daily filing rate is a decline of 9.5%.

Although it is still early to put too much stock in such an analysis, extrapolating the filing rate for the first part of 2012 suggests that there will be just under 1.3 million total bankruptcy filings for the year. For comparison, in 2010, just two years ago, annual bankruptcy filings were 1.56 million.

The reason for the decline is two-fold. First, there was less consumer borrowing happening in 2008 and 2009, leaving less of an "inventory" of debt for bankruptcy discharge today. Second, consumers who are living close to the financial edge and who might be candidates for bankruptcy are finding it a little easy to come by more credit today than was true a year ago. This marginal extra bit of liquidity can be enough to stave off a bankruptcy filing. Looking at the long term -- two or three years out -- I would expect to see bankruptcy filing rates begin to move back up as consumers' balance sheets begin to fill back up with debt. Any contractions of the availability of consumer credit also are likely to lead to increases in the bankruptcy filing rate.

Private competition works.

From this time last year, enrollment in Medicare Advantage rose 10 percent and premiums have fallen 7 percent, the Department of Health and Human Services announced today: Enrollment has risen to 12.8 million in 2012, while average premiums have fallen 7.2% to $31.54, confirming loose projections from September that enrollment in Medicare Advantage plans would [...]

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"He rose above the fray by sticking to issues."

In a blog post that is not to be missed, Hot Air founder and longtime conservative stalwart Michelle Malkin this morning threw the weight of her opinion behind former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum — and, perhaps even more importantly, explained why she chose not to endorse the other three candidates. She has had — and [...]

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"He rose above the fray by sticking to issues."

In a blog post that is not to be missed, Hot Air founder and longtime conservative stalwart Michelle Malkin this morning threw the weight of her opinion behind former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum — and, perhaps even more importantly, explained why she chose not to endorse the other three candidates. She has had — and [...]

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Gaining.

Hey, Mitt Romney can finally look at a poll today where he’s leading.  Unfortunately, it’s still bad news for Romney, as the Gallup national tracking poll shows Newt Gingrich has closed to within one point over the last three days.  Romney now leads Gingrich only 29/28, dropping one point while Gingrich rose three overnight.  That [...]

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Highest since June.

Wonder how we could have gotten stuck at a 2.0% GDP growth rate in Q4?  Novembers import and export numbers might tell a big part of the story.  The trade deficit jumped more than ten percent as American exports fell, while import purchases driven by oil shot upward, while the year-on-year trade deficit rose almost [...]

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Sears and K-Mart to close 120 stores next year.

After a few weeks of trending reduction, if not overwhelming momentum toward a net job-creation level, the number of initial jobless claims rose last week by 15,000 to 381,000.  The Department of Labor also reported that they adjusted last week’s figure upward by 2,000 claims, but this report will almost certainly be adjusted by a [...]

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Take the poll: What will September's jobless rate be?

The Department of Labor’s report of initial weekly jobless claims shows that last week’s precipitous drop in filings looks legit — if short-lived.  The previous week’s level of 391,000 claims — a 37,000-claim drop from the previous week — only got upwardly revised by 4,000.  However, this week’s claims rose by 6,000 to finish above [...]

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Mixed news.

Friday brings us the September unemployment report, but Bloomberg reports on a disturbing indicator this morning.  According to one industry analyst, announced job cuts rose 212% from the previous September and hit a two-year high (via Instapundit): U.S. employers announced the most job cuts in more than two years in September, led by planned reductions [...]

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"Unexpectedly!"

Initial weekly jobless claims rose 2,000 to 414,000 from last week’s adjusted figure of 412,000, in what any statistician would say is statistical noise.  It represents a 0.485% change from the week before.  The rolling 4-week average rose 3750 to 414,750, a change of 0.912% from last week’s report.  Both are barely deviations week-on-week, and [...]

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"More than expected."

The level of weekly initial jobless claims rose slightly this week by 5,000 to 417,000.  The change pushed the 4-week average up by almost the same amount to 407,500, thanks also to an upward revision of last week’s report: In the week ending August 20, the advance figure for seasonally adjusted initial claims was 417,000, an increase [...]

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