Housing starts are on the rise again, yet the DJIA has only recovered a little of the value from the losses from 2008 and early 2009.  While we may still may be feeling the effects of the recession, it is clear that most indications are moving in the right direction.

The US Department of Labor – Bureau of Statistics released the January Mass Layoff Events data for January.  I have been watching the Mass Layoff events for a while now for a couple of reasons, but primarily as a leading indicator of the economy.  I spoke last year a great deal how the number had exceeded 2000 events for 12 straight months and how this was most likely a sign of a protracted recovery period.   The January number was 1,761 which was roughly the same for the last three months.  While the move under 2,000 was at least a step in the right direction it appears as if we continue at an elevated rate.

Job creation is one of the primary keys to economic recovery and it seems as if we are still shedding above normal levels of jobs.   Continuing at 1,700+ events (which in Jan actually meant 180,000 claimants – or an annualized number of over 2 mil initial claimants.  The point is that I feel the economic climate is still contracting, though perhaps at now slower rates.

From a street level assessment I am starting to hear of more projects starting, consulting firms seems to be a little more optimistic outlook for the year, and less people concerned about their current state.

One bit of interesting news is that the number of layoffs (officially claimants) per event was at one of its lowest levels since the beginning of 1999.  This means that while the number of layoff events is still high, there were fewer claimants per event (fewer people laid off or more found something else), or that instead of 200,000 claimants, we saw only 165,346.  This number is a healthier indicator than the number of events (see the dotted red lines in the chart below and compare the crimson line and the blue line from the chart above).

What is more interesting in news around this is that housing starts are on the rise and the stock market is up this morning on the announcement of the CPI data.

Stocks rise ahead of Fed decision

We lost 11,000 jobs compared to the 130,000 that Wall Street expected.  Or perhaps we have cut so many jobs the last few months, that we could not find a place to cut anymore.  I am also curious if this isn’t a little manipulated either in timing or impact as the President has been calling for job creation.

What I would really like to see out of Congress and the White House are very specific plans around job creation.  Just like a company saying we want to see 20% growth, yet not laying out the specific marketing, sales, and operational plans to get there it is all just hope.  And hope is not strategy.

This is similar to ad-hoc analysis without purpose.  We do something once and create a little hype.  When we don’t have any vehicle to take advantage of the newly found ideas, the idea dies as does the learning.

Think about the process of how you handle ad-hoc analytics within your organization:

• Do you have the right minds constantly looking for new issues?
• Or, do you put the right minds on solving issues when they arise?
• Can you name your best analytical minds?  Are they assigned to thought leadership and problem solving?
• Do you use your analytical minds to challenge the knowledge levels of others?
• How do you foster new thinking?

Consistency breeds familiarity, and familiarity breeds knowledge

In the chart below are two parallel lines marking a rough trend of the CPI.  It appears as if the steady growth rate is returning.  This is at least an indication that the economy is stabilizing.

If you are looking for more information relevant to your industry – check out www.bls.gov/ppi/.  They break out the information a number of different ways.

(Here is the link to the commissioner’s report to Congress and the original report)

If we look at a visual of the informtion, a number of things jump out at least to me:

1.  The Good, it looks like (at least to me) the higher the number, or the swifter the increase, the quicker the the unemployment rate drops.  There appears to be a natural slope (green line – A) to the decline in the the unemployment rate after a spike, which then is followed by a less gradual slope that marks a return to a healthy market (red line – B).  In roughly 1975 and again in 1983 we saw two spikes which then followed the green line’s slope – except in the case of 1983, we actually saw that trend bear out over the longer term, yet moved faster during the initial recovery period (reb box).

2. The Bad – if this follows the trend pattern of 1983 we may be looking at another 7-8 year recovery process to return the unemployment rate to around 6% which roughly appears to be natural healthy level.

3. The Ugly – We have yet to see the peak of this trend.  And even if this does turn around in the next month or two, we are so bad a shape across so many other sectors it may take far longer for us to return to a 6% unemployment rate.  If we continue to see credit tighten up at the rate it is going, we will see continued pressure on unemployment.

OPEC mostly gets away with what it wants in terms of prices, and China is clearly working to leverage its relations with OPEC countries to improve its position.  While this isn’t necessarily bad for the US, we do lose some of our bargaining power.  And as China continues to increase demand, it drives up market prices.

I am going to try to add the Price of Oil to the Baumohl Indicator series on a bi-weekly basis.  My goal is to continue to explore some of the indicators of US Economic Performance and how they impact business cycles.