Don’t take most of what you read about the economy these days too seriously. If you’re not a Wall Street trader or a still employed economist, it will only make you unhappy and/or furious. Rather, just peruse web sites on the Internet for headlines that are good for a chuckle. Here’s a few I picked off various sites just today.
“S&P 500 Claims the 1,100 Mark — Recovering ’07 Levels.” This was on the MarketWatch site. ’07 levels, you may recall, were at the height of the bubble that burst with such awful worldwide economic consequences. But maybe this time it will be different.
Here’s a head from today’s Bloomberg site. “General Motors Generates $3.3 Billion in Cash, Will Start Repaying Loans.” Sound good? Sound like GM is selling lots more cars and bouncing back from its recent bankruptcy? That’s not exactly the case. The company actually lost another $1.15 billion in the last quarter. But heck. That beat analyst expectations so things with this outfit and its primary owners (U.S. taxpayers) will doubtless all work out just fine.
My favorite head of the day appeared on the New York Times site. It reads: “Mexicans Send Money North to Help Relatives.” No, this is not a joke. It did appear in today’s Times, not in The Onion. But don’t worry. Like you, I have enormous confidence in our economic planners in Washington and Wall Street. They almost certainly know what they are doing. And if not, well, maybe the headlines will just keep getting even more amusing.