On The Economic Populist you might have noticed the middle column. We try to list other sites and blogs who have exceptional insight and writing on what is happening in the U.S. economy.

Sometimes though, one cannot say it better but miss those who did.

Must Read Post #1

The Atlanta Fed blog looked deeper into the inventory question after wholesale inventories came up plus the fact most of Q4 2009 GDP was inventories.

ever since the advance fourth quarter gross domestic product report indicated that 3.4 percentage points of the then-reported 5.9 percent annualized growth rate was accounted for by a slowing in the pace of inventory decumulation. (The numbers have subsequently been revised to 3.8 percentage points of a 5.6 percent growth rate.) It certainly appears that inventory-sales ratios have reverted to the prerecession norm, justifying Duy's sense that inventories will not be a big part of the economic story as we move through 2010.

That conclusion does rest, of course, on the likelihood that a downward trend in the ratio truly did break in the middle part of the decade. As the chart shows, the same pause in the trend occurred in the mid-1990s, only to commence its southward trek on the other side of the 2001 recession.

But the situation is even more curious than that. If you dig a little deeper, you find that not all inventory-sales ratios tell the same story. In particular, inventory-to-sales ratios at the retail level look very lean relative to prerecession levels while manufacturer's inventories still appear to be relatively bloated.

Must Read Post #2

You may have noticed that retail sales increased dramatically. This post, Strategic Defaults Increase Consumer Spending has some very scary statistics and theories as to why and it's not the good news one would think.

Must Read Post #3

Rortybomb amplifies yet another reason the big banks need to be broken up. They control the credit default swap market. (h/t Naked Capitalism)

Must Read Post #4

We got another call out on Geithner, this time on Citigroup.

the Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission disclosed that a peer review study by other Federal Reserve banks in 2005 found that the New York Fed “had insufficient resources to conduct supervisory activities” of Citigroup.

Geithner, who led the New York Fed from 2003-2009, did not seek additional resources in the wake of the study, according to testimony before the commission on Wednesday by Alan Greenspan, who was chairman of the Federal Reserve at the time.

We’ve reported earlier on Geithner’s extensive contacts with Citigroup officials during his tenure at the New York Fed. In the end, the Federal Reserve was unable to curb practices that led Citigroup to the brink of collapse in 2008 and required a massive federal bailout.

On a Final note

Happy tax day, I personally just got walloped and the word is Harry Reid is going to push through financial reform in the Senate on the floor. So, finding authors tracking on the latest politics on what is actually in the bills now is of importance (in spite of do nothing Congressional burn out).