The government is shutting down its online clearing house of U.S. economic data. EconomicIndicators.gov is maintained by the Economics and Statistics Administration of the Department of Commerce. It brings together data from various government agencies in one convenient place. Readers can see GDP and import-export figures, which are collected by the Bureau of Economic Analysis, and numbers for retail sales and durable goods shipments, collected by the Census Bureau.
Or, rather, they could. It seems that the government is shutting the site down “due to budgetary constraints.” This is being described by many as move to make it more difficult for the public to see just how bad the economy has become. “The Bush administration’s latest move is to simply hide the data,” Think Progress writes.
Barry Ritholtz says it reminds him of the government’s refusal to publish figures for M3, a measure of the money supply. Many suspect that this has allowed the government to inflate the money supply without informing the public. “This new development implies (by parallel comparison to M3) that the economy is actually far, far worse than previously believed,” Ritholtz writes.
Bush Administration Hides More Data, Shuts Down Website Tracking U.S. Economic Indicators [Think Progress]
WTF? Feds Shutting Down Economic Data Site [The Big Picture]
Posted by guest , Feb 15, 2008 12:59PM
http://www.federalreserve.gov/releases/h3/hist/h3hist4.txt
Non-borrowed reserves are negative for the first time since 1976.
Posted by Anal_yst , Feb 15, 2008 1:01PM
How come the site now logs you out after like 30 minutes?
Posted by RamblinWreck , Feb 15, 2008 1:11PM
Wow...that Think Progress blog is something else. I can't believe you guys used that as a source. Maybe there's a real reason behind the left justified format.
Posted by diablo , Feb 15, 2008 1:12PM
The govmnt has a Secretary of Commerce who is a piece of work. Did you hear his interview with Erin and Mark this morning on CNBC? He was painting such a rosy picture of the economy, sort of like that's his job, f@!k the data. He's the data Nazi.
When Mark interrupted him and remarked then why do we need the stimulus package, the clown starts gets stumped and says we need more free trade agreements. Right! The same day that it's reported China's imports are not deflationary anymore! We now import and export inflation. Dollar will continue tanking to balance things out a little.
Posted by BSD , Feb 15, 2008 1:29PM
@Ramblin - ZING!
Posted by lemmerdeur , Feb 15, 2008 1:37PM
I'm sure the $450 a month they are saving will help stimulate the economy.
Posted by lift all the offers , Feb 15, 2008 2:16PM
Miniplenty regrets the malreporting of statistics. It is plusungood. Recdep at Minitrue is correcting mistakes in the data.
Posted by mrpink , Feb 15, 2008 2:49PM
I say it's time to fire up the Outlook and MS Word apps and start writing. Hell, I'll even register a website devoted to the cause of saving the economic indicators site.
Time to start the protest, fellas.
-mrp
Posted by Anal_yst , Feb 15, 2008 4:26PM
doubleplusungood, bro
Posted by guest , Feb 15, 2008 5:25PM
Barry Ritholtz sees conspiracies in everything
Posted by guest , Feb 15, 2008 8:46PM
Thanks for the info, Diablo. Couldn't see CNBC this morning.
I'm suprised, though. A Bush cabinet member a total idiot?
Liked the clever references to Orwell.
Posted by Bugs Meany , Feb 16, 2008 10:42AM
#1 hot topic on ThinkProgress: torture. You mean the report about al Qaeda burning prisoners alive? No, silly! Pouring water on dudes' heads, that's what we need to talk about.
Posted by guest , Feb 16, 2008 4:37PM
Bugs, pouring water on dudes' heads is known as waterboarding, and it simulates drowning.
Waterboarding was prosecuted as a war crime by the US after WW II. The current US Attorney General testified before Congress that he can't decide whether it's legal or not, based on past precedent.
Waterboarding was used a few years ago in interogations conducted by US agencies, possibly because the agents received bad legal advice from the US Attorney General's office.
The question is should these agents, who acted in good faith on behalf of their country, be subject to liability for committing torture? Evolving international law may allow other jurisdictions to start proceedings against these agents, proceedings which could tie them up for years and threaten their liberty.
It's kind of a knotty national issue.
Posted by guest , Feb 17, 2008 10:01PM
I'll second what guest @ 5:25 said about BR. I just can't bring myself to read his blog any more. He and especially the vast majority of BP commenters are a bunch of nihilistic shrills.