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...bullish? Historical data indicate that consumers step up spending in the year following a recession's trough, says Canally. However, he concedes this year's snapback won't be as big as those following the last two recessions, since consumers currently face headwinds from high unemployment, the battered housing sector and frozen credit markets. "We're well into a jobless recovery, credit lines have been cut, and consumers can no longer use their houses as ATMs," he says. Nevertheless, Canally says, consumers are benefiting from last year's rebound in the stock market and higher consumer savings rate, which makes...
...Arctic ice cover might melt away. But it didn't, because of unusually favorable ocean currents and weather patterns. "Early in the 2009 season it looked like we might be on the way to a record melt," says Julienne Stroeve, a research scientist at the National Snow and Ice Data Center, in Boulder, Colo., "but then winds spread the ice out, so the overall coverage ended up being greater than in 2007." Without those winds, in other words, 2009 might have set a new record for open water. But as it happened, ice cover in 2008 and 2009 rebounded significantly...
...mortgage rates, boost housing prices and pull us out of recession. Now that the recession seems to be over, hawks are badgering him to start tightening the money supply to avoid inflation and an overheated economy. Bernanke's response is simple: What inflation? There's little evidence in the data, and even a cursory review of the morning papers suggests that the economy is still underheated. Bernanke repeatedly stressed that the big problem today is high unemployment, that places like Dillon are suffering, that persistent joblessness can create ripple effects that damage families, communities and the nation for generations...
...rest of the answer is that Bernanke believes a Fed chairman needs to act like he's worried about inflation - and actually worry about inflation - even when he doesn't think it's around the corner. Inflation fears may not be justified by data today, but they can be self-fulfilling tomorrow, and the hawks who harbor them are quite influential on Wall Street. If markets and Chinese bondholders start to lose confidence in the value of the U.S. dollar, that could trigger another panic, regardless of the rationality of their fears. A little inflation might be a good thing...
...obsessed with inflation and unconcerned with jobs while hawks think the opposite is not proof that he has found appropriate middle ground. And he shouldn't be confirmed just because markets are freaking out that he might not be. But Fed chairmen are supposed to be apolitical, analytical and data-driven; Bernanke is all those things, and he did, after all, save the world. If Republicans don't want to give Obama a victory, they should think of Bernanke as one of Bush's best appointees. And if Democrats want to distance themselves from Wall Street, they should pass tough...