Stanley Bing
Recession recovery blues
May 2, 2012: 5:00 AM ETIf the downturn is receding, why is my mood indigo?
By Stanley Bing
FORTUNE -- Spring has sprung. The grass is riz. So it's reasonable to ask where the birdies is. Because I don't know about you, but I don't see no birdies. I'm tense. I'm nervous. I guess you could say that my consumer confidence is sort of ... leaky. Why should that be? All signs point to a slow and steady recovery. Slow and steady is good. As we know, it wins the race. And yet ... there's this pricking in my thumbs.
Perhaps I should consider the reasons why, as usual, I am wrong about this kind of thing.
First of all, and perhaps most important, there's the market. Its fettle couldn't be better. Uppity up up up it goes, and where it stops, nobody knows, except maybe Lloyd Blankfein. Also the hedge fund guys personally made billions of dollars last year. Billions! That's gotta be evidence of a recovery. A few years ago those guys were making only hundreds of millions. Now they're back.
Venture capitalists have so much money bulging from their jeans that they can barely fit through the metal detectors on their way to All Things D. If you've got an idea for an Internet application that can be a bright, shiny little toy in the eye of every 14-year-old for 10 minutes and go public right before it pops like a soap bubble, you could make $100 million in a couple of years. So credulity has returned as well, a solid building block in any drive for irrational growth.
Unemployment is going in the right direction too, unless you're a fan of unemployment. I know some people are, at least for others, since too much employment can kick off an inflationary trend, and we all hate inflation. But there is no inflation. The 99% don't have enough money to fuel it. And with the Fed in a state of permanent constipation, it doesn't look as if there's going to be any annoying bump in interest rates for a good long time.
The other numbers aren't so bad either. The Conference Board Leading Economic Index for the U.S. increased 0.7% in February to 95.5, following a 0.2% increase in January and a 0.5% increase in December. "Continued broad-based gains in the LEI for the United States confirm a more positive outlook for general economic activity in the first half of 2012," said one of their economists. Another added, "Recent data reflect an economy that improved this winter." I think it's a positive sign that the Conference Board can afford to employ more than one economist. When economists thrive, we all prosper.
And then there's the entire political situation, whatever that is. The way I look at it, there are two possibilities. The Republicans could take over in November, leading to tax legislation that would favor those who have money over those who don't and a host of regressive measures that would be good for business. Or the President could triumph, leading to four more years of an obstructionist Congress that would block any attempts at sensible regulation and economic reform, which will be good for business.
So why do I feel as if I may have left the stove on and I'm miles from home?
Perhaps it's the news that three major banks are on the verge of being radically downgraded by Moody's, including the one where I have my checking account, and another where I keep whatever piddling lucre I have managed to sock away for my gold-plate years. Maybe it's the whole debt thing, which nearly brought us all down last summer and hasn't been solved, and won't be either. Or maybe it's this pain in my knee that developed when I set the incline on the treadmill too high a few months ago.
Yeah, that must be it. My knee hurts. I'll just take some drugs, have a couple of drinks, and forget about it. That should help me get with the program.
This story is from the April 30, 2012 issue of Fortune.
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FORTUNE -- This document will help you understand the United States Internal Revenue Code, Title 26 of the U.S. Code (26 USC) as you prepare to file your 2011 returns. Fitting this service onto a single page has necessitated abridgements. The actual tax code is more than 3 million words long and would fill 7,500 pages if printed on letter-size paper. For MORE
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Does your employer belong in the pantheon? Could it be that the answer depends on where you stand?
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FORTUNE -- We've done our best to identify corporations that are a pleasure to work for. But we couldn't possibly list them all. Maybe your company, too, is a party on a half shell! Take this quiz and find out.
When I go to work in the morning, I ...
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FORTUNE -- Happy 2022! No, that's not a typo, although it sure seems like it could be. 2022! For a while there it didn't look like we were going to make it, did it? But I think it's fair to say that with the destruction of the last fleet of Nebulons and MORE
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All I want for Christmas
I don't ask for much. A stable euro. An economic recovery. A new Congress. And a Vitamix.
FORTUNE -- Dear Santa
Hi again. It's me, Stan. How is Mrs. Claus? And the elves? Still on leave from Wharton? How about the North Pole? I hear it's melting. That can't be good. Anyhow, enough about you. This is about me, and all the good things I want to find under my tree this MORE
Bing - Dec 28, 2011 1:36 PM ET -
Europe, go home!
Whatever you've got, it's obviously contagious. So until you're feeling better, hasta la vista, baby!
FORTUNE -- So I came into work this morning, and before I even had a chance to butter my muffin, I watched our stock take a nosedive. And we weren't alone. The whole market was bleeding. "Drat," I said, although that was not the word I used. I called Tupper, our IR guy. "What's up?" I MORE
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The peasants are revolting!
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FORTUNE -- Order! Order! All right then. This meeting of the Ultra-Secret Super Committee to Defeat the Wall Street Occupation is now in session. And let me just say how nice it feels to be back together after the hiatus of the past several years. Let's not let our agendas lapse that way ever again, gentlemen. It's too much MORE
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The BlackBerry's preserve
If you want to play Angry Birds, get an iPhone. But if you need to do business, stand by your old friend.
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