My Economists: Bottom Line First

I listened to a Vistage pocast with ITR Economic's Alan and Brian Beaulieu recently, and I'm going to share what "my economists" have to say in bite-size chunks.

The bottom line first.  The Vistage economists at ITR had been predicting a second half 2014 slow down that they even labeled a recession, albeit a mini one.  There was no reference to that in this late December presentation. 

They did predict some sector downturns in the latter half, but no use of the "R" word was ever detected with regard to 2014.

I took away a ton of material on China, Europe (particularly Germany), the Fed, demographics, and reshoring.  All are useful things to watch out for in 2014.

Here's the quick takes on their forecasts and analysis:

• China growth is not coming at the expense of the U.S.

• Natural gas costs in the U.S. are 1/4 of what they are in Germany, but Germany is starting to do some things about it.

• The Fed may be more inclined to allow some inflation in the future.  We could learn more on that soon.

• Joel Kotkin's demographics and his book The Next Hundred Million got a mention too.  I was glad to link my demographer with my economists.

• Near-sourcing and reshoring are real.  That's almost a verbatim quote.

Stay tuned.