Weekly Economic Update: July 24 – July 28, 2017
CHART OF THE WEEK
Loss of GDP from Lower Employment
Last week’s chart showed how U.S. employment compared with that of the U.K. since the recession. Had U.S. employment recovered as fast as the U.K.'s, U.S. real GDP would have been $700 billion higher in 2016 alone, and annual growth would have averaged about 2.6% during the recovery instead of 2.1%. Policies to foster business investment and dynamism would have increased growth further, and released more of America’s economic potential, which the previous administration’s policies constrained.
LAST WEEK
News & Commentary Weekly Highlights
Hoover Institution: On the Prospects for Higher Economic Growth (by John Cogan, Glenn Hubbard, John Taylor, and Kevin Warsh)
MarketWatch: What Mexico and Canada want from the NAFTA renegotiation
Wall Street Journal: Fed Faces Inflation Conundrum
Wall Street Journal: Markets to Fed: Please Leave Us Alone
Top Economic Indicator Highlights
New Residential Construction (June, seasonally adjusted at annual rates, thousands of units)
Jun-2017 May-2017 Apr-2017 Jun-2016
preliminary revised final last year
Building permits 1,254 1,168 1,228 1,193
Housing starts 1,215 1,122 1,144 1,190
Housing completions 1,203 1,144 1,098 1,113
Noteworthy: Since 2011, the sluggish, but upward, march of new residential construction goes on. Newly issued building permits, starts, and completions are now comparable to what they were in the early 1990s but remain nearly half of what they were in the mid-2000s.
JEC Releases
5 Takeaways from the Social Security and Medicare Trustees Report
JEC Explores a Record Number of Job Vacancies
THIS WEEK
Upcoming Economic Data and Events
Monday
Existing Home Sales (10:00am)
Tuesday
Philly Fed Non-Manufacturing Survey (8:30am)
Consumer Confidence Index (10:00am)
Richmond Fed Survey (10:00am)
Wednesday
New Residential Sales (10:00am)
Federal Reserve FOMC Meeting Statement (2:00pm)
Thursday
Revised Building Permits (8:00am)
Advance Durable Goods (8:30am)
Advance Economic Indicators (8:30am)
Chicago Fed National Activity Index (8:30am)
Friday
Gross Domestic Product (Advance Estimate) (8:30am)
Employment Cost Index (8:30am)
Michigan Consumer Sentiment (10:00am)