Pain Misery index, with & without housing

[bart]

Pain Misery index, with & without housing


Here's both the shorter and long term pictures of the Pain Misery index, which simply adds the unemployment rate to the inflation rate as measured by CPI-U.

I've also taken the liberty of showing CPI-U with John Williams CPI-U corrections, for reference. Some believe that his work overstates CPI-U, and that's fine with me. The important point is that CPI-U is significantly understated, not so much by how much.

The "U-3" unemployment measure is the one that's "normal" and reported in the media.

"U-6" includes all marginally attached workers, plus total employed part time for economic reasons, as a percent of the civilian labor force plus all marginally attached workers.
It's the closest to real unemployment in my opinion, and the one that should be used when comparing to other countries.


http://www.nowandfutures.com/images/pain_misery_index_short.png



http://www.nowandfutures.com/images/pain_misery_index.png









And here's a different take on it - adding in housing:

http://www.nowandfutures.com/images/pain_misery_housing_short.png


http://www.nowandfutures.com/images/pain_misery_housing_index.png



Note that John Williams (shadowstats.com) work shows that even U-6 understates total employment, due to various changes in the definition over the years and decades, similar to what has occurred to CPI-U. His estimates have been running 3-4% above U-6.

All charts from my key stats page.

[bart]

Here's a couple more views, the first set including the University of Michigan Consumer Sentiment Index, inverted.

http://www.nowandfutures.com/images/pain_misery_conf_index_short.png

http://www.nowandfutures.com/images/pain_misery_conf_index.png









This one attempts to add in housing and Dow data, and is a first and very much "beta" attempt.

http://www.nowandfutures.com/images/pain_misery_housing_stock_idx.png

[jk]

thanks, bart. sobering stuff. and it provides yet another analog to that 70's show.

[bart]

thanks, bart. sobering stuff. and it provides yet another analog to that 70's show.

My pleasure jk, and thanks for the nudge too.

One of the best things about those charts is how they provide a perspective, both short and very long term, and allow one to move back from the day to day noise.