These numbers can erase that ‘Grinch-y’ feeling
No one likes to enter the holiday season in a foul mood. The change in the weather and the disappearing daylight are enough to keep you down in December. But here are a few “gifts” in the form of economic trends that we hope will sustain you into 2015.
So if you're feeling low, here are a few “gifts” in the form of economic trends that we hope will sustain you into 2015:
Business confidence is up in Massachusetts. Business leaders' faith in business conditions reached its highest level of the year in November, and its highest since April 2012, according to Associated Industries of Massachusetts (AIM), which has been measuring business confidence each month for 23 years. What's even more encouraging is that business leaders have more faith in what lies ahead over the next six months than in what they're seeing today. “It is surprising that problems in the global economy — (such as) recession or near-recession in Europe and Japan, and slowing growth in China — are not enough to put a damper on these expectations,” said Fred Breimyer, an economist at the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. who serves on AIM's board of economic advisors.
The U.S. manufacturing industry is stronger. Manufacturing activity in the U.S. expanded for the 18th straight month in November while the overall economy grew for the 66th month in a row, according to the Institute for Supply Management's (ISM) monthly survey of supply chain executives. For manufacturing, most indicators are pointing in the right direction: new orders, employment, production, inventories, order backlog, all of which rose, and prices for raw materials, which fell.
Stock markets are up. The major stock market indices are on track for healthy gains of close to 10 percent, despite an October swoon.
Construction spending is better than expected. Construction spending across the U.S. rose 1.1 percent in October to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of $971 billion, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. But in fact, it was nearly double the expectations of analysts polled by Yahoo Finance. The increase continued an upward trend for all of 2014.
More businesses are hiring. Private-sector employment in the U.S. grew by 208,000 jobs in November, according to automatic payroll processor ADP. Although that was slightly below expectations, it marked the eighth month out of the last nine in which job gains have topped 200,000, which many economists see as a sign of strong job growth.
Gas prices are down. If you depend on gasoline to keep your business running, it's hard to argue that a 60-cents-per-gallon plunge at the pumps is not doing you any favors (unless you're an oil producer — and there aren't many of those in New England). Even if you don't run a vehicle fleet, your workers have to be enjoying the extra cash in their pockets. That little extra means a little more money to spend, and in an economy such as ours that depends on consumer spending, those are good numbers.
It's taken several years to shake off the effects of the Great Recession, and while the local economy has picked up, albeit in fits and starts over the last five years, it now appears to finally be gaining stronger traction. All these numbers bode well for 2015.
So go ahead and feel glum about the weather — but not the slumping economy — because it's finally showing the long-awaited but steady signs of recovery.
WBJ Web Partners
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