假期购物季前美国经济适时好转

    到今年圣诞节前，美国经济可能终将迎来众人期待已久的那种复苏。

    经济学家预期，在衰退过后，一个经济体的增长速度将高于它的长期增长潜力，从而最终赶上衰退前的大趋势。但美国经济的最新复苏却并不符合这种预期。美国经济非未恢复元气，而是依然走势迟缓。

    不过，周二公布的修订后GDP增速表明，美国经济或终将迎来我们期盼已久的高于趋势线的快速增长。高频经济公司（High Frequency Economics）美国首席经济学家吉姆•奥沙利文指出，除今年第一季度外，去年年中以来美国的GDP年化增长率一直为3.5%。他写道：“我们相信实际增速至少为3%，甚至是3.5%。无论如何，这都要高于潜在增长率，后者目前的估值不超过2%。”

    上述分析包含了一些令人失望的信息。美联储（Federal Reserve）研究人员本周称，几乎可以确定，金融危机及其后的衰退影响了美国经济的潜在增长率。很多经济学家都预计，考虑到劳动人口老龄化以及人口增长放缓，今后几年美国经济增速将低于二战后的平均水平。

    但是，如果美国经济增速实际上高于趋势值，那就意味着它更接近充分就业状态，而充分就业是提高工资的必要条件。

    有迹象表明薪酬增长或许就要到来。虽然月度就业报告中的工资数据表明，美国人均收入增长率仅与通胀持平；但周二公布的GDP数据显示，个人收入增速几乎是前者的两倍。出现这种情况的原因可能是美国劳工部（Labor Department）的数据并未考虑年终奖等收入。同时，随着失业率持续下降，预计雇主们将不得不通过加薪来应对日趋紧张的劳动力供应。

    除了工资上升，另一个因素也让我们感到乐观。虽然11月份消费者信心下降，但在10月份，世界大型企业联合会（The Conference Board）消费者信心指数飙升至七年新高。正如宏观研究机构Renaissance Macro Research经济研究主管尼尔•杜塔所说，今年打算购房的消费者数量一直在上升，而打算购买大型家电的消费者数量已达到2010年以来的最高点。这或许与汽油价格持续下跌有关。鉴于目前汽油零售价比近期高点低88美分，杜塔认为 ，如果汽油价格保持在这样的低点，随后一年里美国消费者有望节省1190亿美元的开支。

    此次汽油降价正值假期购物旺季逐渐升温之际，消费者可能更愿意消费而非储蓄，从而进一步促进经济增长。

    此外，住房市场也呈现出复苏迹象。周二出炉的Case-Shiller美国楼市报告表明，虽然住宅价格增速继续放缓，但整体趋势很健康。市场预测机构IHS环球透视（HIS Global Insights）经济学家帕特里克•纽波特称，这是一份“很好的报告”，楼市放缓的原因在于供给增多和止赎率下降，而非经济滑坡。

    同时，美国人口普查局（Census Department）周三公布，新建住宅销量与2013年10月份相比上升了1.8%，年化销量为45.8万套。和历史水平相比，这个数字相当低，但相关数据表明建筑业正在持续复苏，只是速度缓慢。

    但经济学家们认为，阻碍销量及建筑业增长的主要原因很简单，即缺乏住户——美国住户数量一直没有明显反弹。不过，如果今年第四季度以及明年工资开始上升，就可能促使年轻人开始购买住房，进而使这些数据恢复到衰退前的正常水平。（财富中文网）

    译者：Joe

    For Christmas this year, the U.S. might finally be given the sort of recovery we’ve all been waiting for.

    Economists expect that following recessions, an economy should grow more quickly than than its long-term potential, so that growth eventually catches up to the pre-recession trend. Our most recent recovery, however, never lived up to this expectation, and the economy simply sputtered along rather than making up for lost time.

    But Tuesday’s revision of GDP growth suggests the U.S. economy might finally be seeing the above-trend growth we’ve been waiting for. As Jim O’Sullivan of High Frequency Economics points out, other than in the first quarter of 2014, the economy has been growing at a 3.5% annual rate since the middle of last year. “We believe the trend in real growth is now at least 3 percent, and possibly even 3.5 percent. In any event, it’s above the potential growth rate, which is probably no more than 2 percent currently,” he writes.

    There is some disappointing news packed into this analysis. As researchers at the Federal Reserve noted this week, the potential growth rate of the economy has most certainly been damaged by the financial crisis and subsequent recession, while many economists predict that the U.S. will grow slower in the coming years than the post World War II average simply because of the aging of the workforce and slowing population growth.

    But if we are, in fact, growing above trend, that means the economy will be closer to reaching full employment—a necessary condition for rising wages.

    And there are signs that this wage growth might be around the corner. While wage data in the monthly jobs report suggests that the average American’s pay is rising only fast enough to keep pace with inflation, Tuesday’s GDP numbers show private income rising at nearly twice that rate, likely because the Labor Department data leaves out income workers earn from sources like annual bonuses. Meanwhile, as the unemployment rate continues to fall, it’s expected that employers will have to respond to a tightening market by raising salaries.

    And there’s reason for optimism beyond rising wages. Consumer confidence ticked down in November, but that was after a huge jump in October that placed the Conference Board’s index at a seven-year high. As Renaissance Macro’s Neil Dutta argues, the number of consumers expecting to buy a home has risen throughout the year, while the number expecting to buy major appliances is at its highest since 2010. This may have something to do with consistently declining gas prices. Since retail gas prices are 88 cents below their recent highs, Dutta argues that American consumers could end up saving a total of $119 billion over the next year, if prices stay this low.

    With this price break coming just as the holiday shopping season ramps up, consumers might be willing to spend rather than save that money, giving an extra boost to the economy.

    And finally, the housing market is showing signs of life. Tuesday’s Case-Shiller report demonstrated that while home price appreciation is continuing to slow, the trend is healthy. IHS Global Insights’ Patrick Newport called it a “good report,” arguing that the slowdown is due to added supply and fewer foreclosures rather than a weakening economy.

    Meanwhile, the Census Department announced on Wednesday that new home sales increased 1.8% from last October, to an annual rate of 458,000 units. While this number is quite low by historical standards, the data show that the construction industry is continuing to recover, albeit slowly.

    But economists believe that the main force holding back new sales and construction is simply the lack of household formation, which has yet to rebound in a significant way. But if wages begin to pick up in the final quarter of 2014 and next year, that could be a catalyst for young people to begin to move into their own homes, and for these data to recover to their pre-recession norms.