These two magazines came out the same week:
>
The Economist: June 18, 2005
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Compare and Contrast:
Time Magazine June 13, 2005
Please use the comments to demonstrate your own ignorance, unfamiliarity with empirical data, ability to repeat discredited memes, and lack of respect for scientific knowledge. Also, be sure to create straw men and argue against things I have neither said nor even implied. Any irrelevancies you can mention will also be appreciated. Lastly, kindly forgo all civility in your discourse . . . you are, after all, anonymous.
"Money is power, & you ought to be reasonably ambitious to have it." —Russell H. Conwell, Temple Univ, 1877
"It's the end of the world as we know it and I feel fine" say the French as consumer confidence in May rose to the highest since Nov '10 as they welcome and get excited about new Pres Hollande. Also, the French 10 yr bond yield touched the lowest on record this morning. June consumer confidence in Germany held at 5.7, just .2 pts off the highest since Mar '11. To the euro bond debate which is now taking on greater rhetoric with those with high bond yields wanting them and those with low ones saying no way, ECB member...
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August 12th, 2009 at 10:33 am
Kind of sums up nicely why magazines like Time, Newsweek, etc. are struggling while others like The Economist seem to be doing much better. Here’s a novel thought – put out a good product (in this case a publication with real journalistic chops and integrity) and people will pay money for it! Go figure.
August 12th, 2009 at 10:42 am
I saved that issue of the Economist for three years. Had just discovered Calculated Risk, started my own similar (but not successful) blog, and started telling friends and family that RE doom was coming.
The article was not actually very good.
August 12th, 2009 at 10:47 am
It’s all you need to know about where things are headed. This may actually be more like 2005 in the housing market than 2007, like I posted earlier. But the carousel is tightening its diameter, and we’ll likely be back to 2008 in less than the three years it took before.
August 12th, 2009 at 10:49 am
Interestingly, that brick seems to be in the plutosphere (not even a swath of terra firma in sight).
I suppose in the 2009 version, you’d start to be able to see some land, but you’d also have Benny & Timmy furiously trying to tie a bungee cord onto it.
August 12th, 2009 at 10:52 am
The Economist is the only magazine worth reading. Glad it’s not published in this country.
August 12th, 2009 at 10:55 am
Don’t fight the trend me friend….. pretty boy wynn, up how much, since 3/9/9 lows????
August 12th, 2009 at 11:20 am
The only interesting news item on the Time cover is “Why Deep throat came out”.
Economist is the best and is read only by a few in the USA.
August 12th, 2009 at 11:21 am
Curmudgeon
Agreed. It seems we’re doing the whole ’02-’07 cycle all over again but in a much tighter time line. It’s like the last bull market writ small.
August 12th, 2009 at 11:28 am
The Economist is written for people with a highschool education, Time is written for a 7th grade education. The people that read Time are the ones buying FNM FRE C TOL. Joe Granville had it right.
August 12th, 2009 at 11:31 am
I’ve been reading The Economist for about 15 years. I’ve noticed within the last 5 that they have become increasingly more like Time and Newsweek – more stories that seem to be sloppily written or researched. Still a good magazine, but nowhere near as good as it once was.
Jacobsk – no, The US is by far the largest market for The Economist.
August 12th, 2009 at 11:33 am
@Thor: I actually agree with that, which is one reason I why I did not renew my subscription with either them or WSJ (the other reason is lack of time and better quality FREE stuff on the internet). The local Minneapolis Star Tribune and maybe Sunday NYTimes are next on my budget cost-cutting chopping block.
August 12th, 2009 at 11:34 am
Interesting -
http://ads.economist.com/the-economist/circulation/regional-increases/
Readership up 99% in 10 years – North American readership (more than half total) has gone up 156%.
August 12th, 2009 at 11:37 am
I tend to disagree. The Economist still continues to be a great read. I read it online as all the content is available free on their site.
August 12th, 2009 at 11:42 am
@manhattan: It’s probably the best there is of the traditional print publications, but I think it often still cow-tow’s to the elite on Wall Street a bit too much for my liking.
August 12th, 2009 at 11:48 am
The Economist famously ran the cover story “World Awash in Oil” (paraphrase) just as oil bottomed and began its quick march to $140 a barrel. I also notice that “House Prices – After the Fall” arrived TWO YEARS
August 12th, 2009 at 11:48 am
Manhattanguy – Definitely think it’s still worth a read and I agree with Mannwich that it’s the best in it’s class. Just think it’s slipped a bit in the last decade.
August 12th, 2009 at 11:52 am
The Economist famously ran the cover story “World Awash in Oil” (paraphrase) just as oil bottomed and began its quick march to $140 a barrel. I also notice that the June 2005 issue “House Prices – After the Fall” arrived well before the peak in house prices and TWO YEARS before house prices started to fall in earnest. A market call that’s two years premature isn’t worth a heck of a lot.
August 12th, 2009 at 11:53 am
@seneca: But I don’t think The Economist is a magazine that you read to determine market swings. They’re not in the business of making market calls, since that’s mostly a fools game, if I’m not mistaken.
August 12th, 2009 at 11:54 am
Have a look at this ’02 Economist cover:
http://robsnextmove.wordpress.com/2008/07/08/the-houses-that-saved-the-world/
August 12th, 2009 at 11:54 am
Maybe someone should send an e-postcard to Tim Geithner of that Economist cover.
Maybe then he would come to his senses and drop his asking price down from 1.4 mil.
August 12th, 2009 at 11:58 am
@deadonarrival
Re: Tim Geithner – He is propping up the market so he can sell his property to the next sucker.
August 12th, 2009 at 11:59 am
Re the Economist. After going to Bush in 2000 they switched to Kerry, then Obama in this cycle. Learning that the “Party of No” and now the party of “Nobody can talk when we Shout” isn’t the way forward.
Congratulations to Pearson PLC.
August 12th, 2009 at 12:01 pm
@manhattanguy
I guess he still doesn’t realize that he IS the sucker.
How does the saying go? If you can’t spot the sucker in the room, the sucker is you!
August 12th, 2009 at 12:05 pm
If you’ve seen the taxes in Mamaroneck, you’ll know Tiny Tim was indeed the sucker.
August 12th, 2009 at 12:07 pm
@LB
Tiny Tim has no problems with taxes. He doesn’t pay them, remember?
August 12th, 2009 at 12:08 pm
@Thor — The Economist publishes slightly different issues in different countries. America gets more America coverage, Britain more Britain, etc…. That may affect what we get here in the US, because that shift happened about 5 years ago.
August 12th, 2009 at 12:10 pm
@dead: LOL. That is hilarious. True though.
August 12th, 2009 at 12:14 pm
@David
Right David. U.S edition is more U.S centric. What I like is their Opinion column, International coverage and the Science &Technology section.
August 12th, 2009 at 12:21 pm
So I guess their theory about why deep throat came out is also wrong.
August 12th, 2009 at 12:42 pm
mannwich says-
“But I don’t think The Economist is a magazine that you read to determine market swings.”
certainly not a periodical for traders- but neither is Time- but at least it points your head in the right direction
DOA-
“taxes are for little people”- Leona Helmsley
August 12th, 2009 at 12:45 pm
@ seneca
The Economist isn´t a market predictor, and I don´t read it as such. In this case though, it´s sure as hell it´s better as such than the Time Mag.
August 12th, 2009 at 12:56 pm
I would also agree with Thor that The Economist is not was it uses to be but I don’t think poor research or sloppy writing is the problem. To me they started drinking the kool-aid and lost some/much of their scepticism on some of the issues. Their ideology started showing which then tainted much of the analysis. That said it is still a hundred billion times better than Time or anything else.
Given all there seems to be these days are ideologues posing as experts I guess I can’t expect to much. This is what the blogs are for right?
August 12th, 2009 at 1:01 pm
VennData,
Economist doesn’t actually endorse candidates, they jut talk them up, put them on the cover more often, and use the cheerful-looking-slant cartoon face instead of the dumb-looking-slant cartoon face in caricitures.
I had the same impression you did, and went back to check. The endorsements were apparent but unquotable.
August 12th, 2009 at 1:11 pm
The Economist lost me when they prattled (nice Brit word per the subject) on glowingly about how good and important was the war in Iraq. It left me thinking they were just hoping we’d reclaim their lost empire for them, and frankly, I’m quite okay with the sun setting on the British, or for that matter, the American empire.
August 12th, 2009 at 1:27 pm
seneca
The housing market did not peak in 2007. You need to go do some more research on this matter.
Depending on how you look at it, housing peaked in mid ’05- ’06. Housing starts and new home sales peaked in ’05, and housing prices in ’06.
Plenty of info and charts at Calculated Risk to research that data.
http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_pMscxxELHEg/ShLFkyjkOvI/AAAAAAAAFSk/hm7qW71DvzM/s1600-h/QuarterlyStartsNewHomeSales.jpg
http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_pMscxxELHEg/ShLF0hoilAI/AAAAAAAAFSs/UThSLhtyF5o/s1600-h/HousingStartsIntentQ1.jpg
http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_pMscxxELHEg/SkoPj99yG5I/AAAAAAAAFro/Gcz61CjeH1A/s1600-h/Case-ShillerAprill2009.jpg
The $HGX, housing index, peaked in Aug ’05. That’s a pretty damned good call, IMO.
So I’d say this mid ’05 call on the coming housing drop was about as well timed as you could get for such a large, diverse and relatively slow moving market. If you sold your house in mid to late ’05, I’d say you made out very well and are quite happy with that move. And if you sold your housing related stocks in that time frame, then same result.
August 12th, 2009 at 1:37 pm
onlooker-
you are correct- 2005 is exactly when people should have started evaluating their positions in anything housing related-
setting stops and locking in profits
August 12th, 2009 at 1:42 pm
I think Maxim’s coverage of the crisis has been excellent. I like publications that allow you to look at subjects in different lights and from many different angles.
August 12th, 2009 at 8:01 pm
Call me a reverse-snob, but I can’t read the Economist at all. There are too many quirky British words, not enough distracting ads, no photos of a cartoon Camel smoking a cigarette, and not enough magazine subscription reply cards falling out of the magazine for me to enjoy it. Sorry!
August 13th, 2009 at 11:48 am
I vividly remember that Economist cover.