FAKE RECOVERY, HOUSING SALES, CPI...

Statistical Deceptions: How Fake is the "Recovery"?

Paul Craig Roberts, Counterpunch.org: The size of the US deficit exceeds in these troubled times the supply of world savings available to fund the US government’s wars, bailouts and stimulus plans. If the Federal Reserve has to monetize the Treasury’s new borrowings by creating demand deposits for the Treasury (printing money), America’s foreign creditors might flee the dollar.

... One looks in vain to the US financial media for accurate economic information. Currently, Wall Street, the White House, and the media are hyping a new sign of economic recovery--”surging” June home sales. John Williams at shadowstats.com predicted this latest reporting deception.

Here is the way Williams explains how statistics can produce false signs of recovery. The economy has been contracting for so long that a plateauing of the falloff in home sales compared to the previous time period’s more rapid contraction can appear like a gain.

The Census Bureau itself notes that the reported 11 per cent increase in June home sales might be illusory. The reporting agency says that the gain is not statistically meaningful at a 90 per cent confidence interval and that “the Census Bureau does not have sufficient statistical evidence to conclude that the actual change is different from zero.”