Tuesday, June 18, 2013

Could Economic Blogging Get Any More Boring?

Stop me if you're read this before.  The EU is in a recession, the US is in slow-growth mode and China is rebalancing its economy.  The sluggishness in developed economies is slowing the growth of emerging economies.  Well - you have read that before.  In fact, that's all anyone has been writing for the last year to year and a half.

Consider this paragraph from the latest policy announcement by the Bank of Korea:

Based on currently available information, the Committee considers the moderate economic recovery in the US to have continued but economic activities in the euro area to have remained sluggish, while emerging market countries such as China have shown slightly lower economic growth than initially anticipated. The Committee expects the global economy to sustain its modest recovery going
forward, but judges that the uncertainties related for instance to the possibility of an earlier-than-expected tapering off of US quantitative easing policy and to the implementations of fiscal consolidation in major countries remain as downside risks to growth 


Compare that statement to the release of December 2012

Based on currently available information, the Committee considers the moderate economic recovery in the US to have continued, but the sluggishness of economic activities in the euro area to have persisted. Economic indicators in emerging market countries have shown signs of gradual improvement. The Committee expects the global economy to exhibit a modest recovery going forward but judges the downside risks to growth to be large, owing chiefly to the euro area fiscal crisis and to the fiscal consolidation issue in the US.


And here's the September 2012 announcement:

Based on currently available information, the Committee considers the economic recovery in the US to have weakened somewhat and the sluggishness of economic activities in the euro area to have deepened. Growth has continued to slow in emerging market countries as well, due mostly to the impact of the economic slumps in advanced countries. The Committee expects the pace of global economic recovery to be very modest going forward and judges the
downside risks to growth to be large, owing chiefly to the spillover of the euro area fiscal crisis to the real economy and to the possibility of the so-called fiscal cliff materializing in the US.


Not much difference, is there?

And don't get me started on how often the Fed has used the word "moderate" in the Beige Book.  

I read a ton of central bank announcements.  They all contain a general outline of the then current economic environment.  For the last year and a half, they could all just say, "that thing we wrote last month?  Ditto."

I just wanted to mention from a writing about the economy perspective, it's just really boring right now.