I’m confident the past couple years will be discussed and dissected by economics students for decades to come.

Here’s just two graphs visualizing the monetary movement that have made my jaw drop:

In both of them, there’s little to no movement for 5 years. Then…WHAM!

It doesn’t really matter what these graphs measuring – the shock is obvious.

jth’s Fed’s borrowing from May 2008:

Kedrosky’s 30-day commerical paper rates:

If this continues to fall, returning to 2006 rates in the next quarter or so, there will be as much discussion on the quickness of the recovery as there will be on the suddenness of shock itself.

It’s March in Minneapolis.

The thermometer just broke 40°F and there’s still inches of snow cover. Winter sustenance in the upper Midwest traditionally comes in two forms: canned or hotdish. Not the most uplifting and exciting dishes to get families through long, grueling winters, but economical.

Citrus fruits were a rarity, rare enough for oranges to be included in the treat bags given out after the elementary school Christmas program.

And according to the news media – we’re working through one of the hardest, coldest, financial winters in a nearly a century.

Yet, right now, at the Cub Foods up the street kiwi fruits are 4 for $1, mangos are 10 for $10, and pineapples are 2 for $5.

Admittedly, this isn’t as scientific as the Big Mac Index, but it’s quite remarkable, that a selection of tropical fruit can be grown, transported from South America (or Southeast Asia) to the middle of North America, in the middle of March, in the middle of a global economic winter, and sold for one or two dollars.

For my money it seems a more substantial – and more delicious – economic indicator is in the produce aisle.

16 April 2013 – Related:

“…bananas were first available commercially to American consumers in 1876…and sold for ten cents. In today’s dollars, that would be the equivalent of $3.00 per banana, or 1,150% more expensive than the 24 cents I paid at the local Safeway a few days ago!” – Mark J. Perry

Remember, a few months ago when crude oil was at it’s highest (Unleaded hit >$4 in my neighborhood) and natural gas was spiking as well?

Considering both are falling (Unleaded is currently $1.85 in my neighborhood), both are sold in US Dollars on the world market, and the US Dollar is trading at it’s highest value in 8 months, I’ve been wondering what’s been so dramatically changing the value of $1 over the course of the year.

While I’m still looking for an answer, I thought this 2 year old blog post was quite prescient.

“…let’s hope Democrats can take the White House in 2008 through good politics and good policy rather than from a crash on Wall Street and a stagnating economy.” – Mark Thoma – University of Oregon, Dept of Econ – on Monday, December 4, 2006

This is the great thing about the proliferation of blogging and good search engines. Separating relevance from timeliness.

Thoma quotes a Robert Reich posts that describes how Hank Paulson’s been playing chicken with the Chinese (via interest rates) for at least 2 years. Smells close, but not quite it.

Back in May, Barry Ritholtz bet James Pethokoukis that we are in a recession.

From my view and the numbers I’ve seen, the downturn is concentrated in the housing sector. A good thing. Unfortunately, housing is a huge percentage of our overall GDP and it completely collapsed.

Reminds me of early 2001, when the tech sector collapsed and slowed down the economy. Other sectors (even specific areas within the tech sector) were still growing.

We’re fortunate that our economy is so diversified that when one area collapses, other sectors can soften the blow.

Taking me back to the bet between Ritholtz and Pethokoukis. I find the bet quite amusing for two reasons;

1. How specific the bounds are in defining “winning”. Because anything less specific is the equivalent to “I know it when I see it.”
2. That the amount of money spent by the “loser”. It could easily approach, if not surpass, the ‘economic stimulus’ tax rebates. An amount designed to get us out of any recession we might be in.

There’s something appealing about removing complexity – and the costs to maintain that complexity – to more effectively improve the behavior of a complex system.

“The assumption is that drivers are accustomed to owning the road and rarely pay attention to speed limits or caution signs anyway. Removing traffic lights and erasing lane markers, the thinking goes, will cause drivers to get nervous and slow down.”

“‘Generally speaking, what we want is for people to be confused,’ said Willi Ladner, a deputy mayor in Bohmte. ‘When they’re confused, they’ll be more alert and drive more carefully.'” – Craig Whitlock, WashingtonPost.com