Sometimes you have to own the fact that it's right to be grim about what is happening. I have long held that we need employment growth to sustain this remarkable rally from March of 2009. We aren't getting it.
I have long held that the government had levers to raise employment: easy policies by the Fed and stimulus by Congress. Those are over or about to end. I thought that leadership by the president could help create jobs, as we have seen with other presidents, notably Bill Clinton. That's been a definitive failure. Four-dollar gasoline, the breakpoint for 2008's economy, hasn't helped. The difference, of course, is that we are awash in oil, even before the OPEC meeting. But the government seems unsophisticated, not seeing that oil has become like stocks, a necessary portfolio allocation, with the big difference that it's a small market and prone to easy manipulation. We know that now from the Commodity Futures Trading Commission's discovery that a couple of tiny hedge-fund managers and a shipper were able to keep oil from coming to the market in 2008. Given that the corner from these little folks worked, we can only draw the conclusion that a much larger group of manipulators took oil to $147 later that year. Of course, there is a big and even more nefarious set of circumstances now. First, the world is pumping much more oil than it was in 2008, with the Saudis making up much more of the Libyan shortfall. So much, in fact, that it has taken oil off the market even as it wants prices lower. Remember, the Saudis believe it doesn't matter how much they pump, the futures aren't going to reflect the truth because non-consumers, using low-margin requirements, can easily take the oil off the market and store it. Add Comment Tweet 1 2 3 Last » Next › adsonar_placementId=1341527;adsonar_pid=879768;adsonar_ps=-1;adsonar_zw=600;adsonar_zh=280;adsonar_jv='ads.adsonar.com'; try { function DM_onSegsAvailable(segs, cust_id) { for (var i=0;i //* Global Functions *// function metadataRegisterNS(ns){ var nsParts = ns.split("."); var root = window; for(var i=0; i Dow Jones S&P 500 NASDAQ 10-Year Note 12,116.45 1,291.70 2,717.21 30.17 Oil * 114.86 DOWN 34.81 DOWN 8.46 DOWN 15.57 UP 0.20 10 Yr 3.02% SPDR Gold 150.44 -0.29% -0.65% -0.57% +0.67% Data delayed 20 minutes Most Popular Stories and Tools var randnum = Math.floor(Math.random() * 100) if (randnum < 45) { document.write("Ex-Dividend Date Calendar"); document.write("Cramer's Latest Picks from Mad Money"); document.write("Bank Safety Ratings and Screener"); document.write("Top-Rated Stocks"); document.write("Highest-Yielding Dividend Stocks"); document.write("Warren Buffett's Portfolio"); } else { document.write("10 Best Dow Dividend Stocks"); document.write("Top 10 'Buy'-Rated Stocks Under $5"); document.write("10 Cities Unaffected by a Bad Economy"); document.write("13 Ugliest Phones of the Mobile Era"); document.write("10 Celebrities Who Lost Big Financially"); document.write("10 Best Craft Beer Vacation Destinations"); } Twitter Facebook RSS Mobile App adsonar_placementId=1341369;adsonar_pid=879768;adsonar_ps=-1;adsonar_zw=320;adsonar_zh=280;adsonar_jv='ads.adsonar.com'; Brokerage Partners Free Newsletters from TheStreetAfter the Bell
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