April PPI up 0.7%; retail sales down 0.5%; jobless claims up to 331,000.

[papau]

April PPI up 0.7%; retail sales down 0.5%; jobless claims up to 331,000.

http://www.bls.gov/news.release/ppi.nr0.htm

Producer Price Index News Release text
http://www.bls.gov/ppi MAY 13, 2004

Producer Price Indexes -- April 2004

The Producer Price Index for Finished Goods advanced 0.7 percent in April, seasonally adjusted, the Bureau of Labor Statistics of the U.S. Department of Labor reported today. This increase followed a 0.5-percent rise in March and a 0.1-percent gain in February. April prices for finished goods other than foods and energy went up 0.2 percent, the same rate of increase as in the previous month. At the earlier stages of processing, the intermediate goods index climbed 1.4 percent, compared with a 0.7-percent gain in March. Prices received by manufacturers of crude goods rose 3.0 percent, after advancing 0.7 percent in the preceding month.(See table A.)

http://www.dol.gov/opa/media/press/eta/ui/current.htm

EMPLOYMENT AND TRAINING ADMINISTRATION May 13, 2004
UNEMPLOYMENT INSURANCE WEEKLY CLAIMS REPORT
SEASONALLY ADJUSTED DATA

In the week ending May 8, the advance figure for seasonally adjusted initial claims was 331,000, an increase of 13,000 from the previous week's revised figure of 318,000. The 4-week moving average was 335,750, a decrease of 7,750 from the previous week's revised average of 343,500.

The advance seasonally adjusted insured unemployment rate was 2.4 percent for the week ending May 1, an increase of 0.1 percentage point from the prior week's unrevised rate of 2.3 percent.

The advance number for seasonally adjusted insured unemployment during the week ending May 1 was 2,974,000, an increase of 53,000 from the preceding week's revised level of 2,921,000. The 4-week moving average was 2,976,000, an increase of 1,750 from the preceding week's revised average of 2,974,250.


UNADJUSTED DATA

The advance number of actual initial claims under state programs, unadjusted, totaled 290,799 in the week ending May 8, an increase of 7,779 from the previous week. There were 364,287 initial claims in the comparable week in 2003.

The advance unadjusted insured unemployment rate was 2.3 percent during the week ending May 1, unchanged from the prior week. The advance unadjusted number for persons claiming UI benefits in state programs totaled 2,846,262, a decrease of 75,102 from the preceding week. A year earlier, the rate was 2.8 percent and the volume was 3,502,794.

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&ncid=716&e=3&u=/ap/20040513/ap_on_bi_go_ec_fi/economy

Wholesale prices shot up by 0.7 percent in April, the largest increase in a year

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&ncid=578&e=7&u=/nm/20040513/bs_nm/economy_retail_dc

Autos, Clothing Push Retail Sales Down
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. retail sales cooled in April, a government report said on Thursday, dragged lower by declines at auto dealers and clothing stores. The Commerce Department said retail sales slid a greater-than-expected 0.5 percent in April to a seasonally adjusted $331.84 billion. Sales excluding autos were off by a smaller 0.1 percent.

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=568&ncid=749&e=1&u=/nm/20040513/bs_nm/economy_jobless_dc

Jobless Claims Up More Than Expected
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Initial claims for U.S. jobless aid climbed more than expected last week...
First-time filings for state unemployment benefits rose 13,000 to 331,000 in the week ended May 8, coming off a November 2000 low, the Labor Department said. Economists polled ahead of the report expected claims to rise to 321,000 from the 315,000 initially reported for the May 1 week

[Yavin4]

1. The Markets Won't Like This

This is what happens when the Fed Chairman politicizes interest rate policies. IOW, Greenspan is trying to keep Bush in power by giving him abnormally low interest rates.

[kysrsoze]

2. Yup - everything's looking really good. Add to this, the imaginary new

job creation numbers, and we have an economy just humming along, don't we?

[dusty64]

3. Yup, no matter

how hard they try to cook the numbers the evidence of the REAL regime "recovery" keep leaking out.

[chenGOD]

4. I've been very curious...

ever since reading about the new job numbers for the US in march and April. They got played up like crazy in the South Korean press, and it seems like other foreign media bought the bait.

http://www.busrep.co.za/index.php?fSectionId=566&fArticleId=2004565

but then I see reports like this from US media: http://www.ohio.com/mld/ohio/business/8655238.htm?1c

So what's the deal? Are the new 600,000 jobs real jobs, or are they McJobs that will get pissed away soon....?

[MadHound]

5. It is McJobs friend

I read somewhere(darn that short term memory loss) this week that the jobs that are being created now average three dollars an hour less than the jobs that they are replacing.

Given that and the fact that the Labor dept keeps revising the job creation numbers downward, all of this happy talk about a rebounding economy and job creation is just so much hot air.

This misadministration is trying desperately to keep the economy together until the election. Whether they do or not we'll have to wait and see. But I guarantee you that in the second week of November the economy and markets are both going to go south at a pretty rapid pace.

[chenGOD]

8. As I feared....

They're trying to spin the news positively to avoid another crisis here in Asia.

I was just shocked to see such huge numbers. I have no doubt that they will be revised downwards, maybe in November...

[Mountainman]

6. I wish they could show the number of unemployed that do not get UI

The real unemployment numbers should include all those looking for work not just those receiving unemployment. Every time a bunch of people lose their unemployment and haven't found a job it improves the unemployment percentage unless job creation decreases the number of newly unemployed and the long term unemployed.

Does anyone know from real facts that can be presented, what the real unemployment percentage is?

[Frodo]

7. They do. But people just pay attention to the "high end" numbers.

This particular weekly report isn't intended to give you that figure - though you could extrapolate it from the "insured unemployment" number here (2.4%) vs. the household report unemployment (5.6%) to see that better than half of those who are unemployed are receiving no benefits at all.

There are also higher numbers for those who are "under"employed or marginally attached to the job market in some other way. They obvioulsy don't get benefits either.

All of these numbers are reported monthly in the press release, but the news just runs with the more common figures (weekly filings, unemployment, job "creation").