Economic Recovery

Maryland's already-modest economic recovery will be even slower for the rest of this year and early 1996, but it will not stall out completely despite high interest rates and accelerating federal budget cuts, a team of University of Baltimore economists predicts.Employment growth, which regional economists use as their chief measure of the state's economic health, will fall off to 0.37 percent in the next three months, just over half as fast as that estimated for the quarter that ends today, the forecast says.

Investors have often been counseled to have a long-term outlook when it comes to planning. In general that's probably sound thinking.But between now and 2000 they may be well-advised to take TC shorter-term view, at least for the next couple of years.Ignore the long view? No. But risks are rising and it will be increasingly important to be cautious and selective in order to find good long-term positions to take."We think about the downside first, and you're late in a major market cycle and in the middle of the economic cycle," said Rick Sunshine, a portfolio manager in Jupiter, Fla."

The announcement yesterday of the merger of unions representing steel workers, machinists and auto workers should give these workers a stronger voice in a changing economy. They need it. The "anxious class" is what Labor Secretary Robert Reich calls the working middle class, worried not only about keeping their jobs in the wake of unending company downsizings but about the shrinking purchasing power of their paychecks.Amid the boom in the stock market, fueled by record corporate profits and a controlled inflation rate, and the surge in productivity rates and booming exports, the American worker is not sharing in the benefits of the nation's economic recovery.

WASHINGTON -- Domestic shipments by U.S. steelmakers in 1993 rose 7.5 percent, to their highest level in 12 years, as the economic recovery triggered a surge in orders from automakers and construction companies, an industry group reported yesterday.Shipments rose to 88.4 million net tons from 82.2 million net tons, the American Iron and Steel Institute said.December shipments rose 12.3 percent, to 7.38 million net tons, from 6.57 million net tons in the same month of 1992, AISI said.The Washington-based trade association said shipments to the automotive industry rose 14.1 percent for the year.

WASHINGTON -- Haven't got enough money to pay the bills? Scared stiff about crime? Convinced your kids won't be able to find a decent job?If so, you're smack in the middle of the anxiety-ridden American mainstream, according to a comprehensive new survey of national opinion released yesterday.The poll by the Times Mirror Co., which publishes The Sun and other newspapers, provides a glimpse into the volatile, dissatisfied mood of the country seven months before the 1994 midterm elections.It shows a nation that remains slow to brighten its outlook, more than two years into an economic recovery.

After lagging far behind for three years, Maryland is poised to at last join fully in the national economic recovery in 1994.In the state and the nation, personal incomes will rise more than they did last year, businesses will sell more goods and services, and more unemployed people will find jobs, economists and business leaders say."The state economy will regain most of its strength and expand at a moderate pace to catch up to the national growth rate," said Chang Min Kong, an economist at Towson State University.

For the first time in three years, fall is not bringing a powerful burst of growth to the U.S. economy. It is a decisive sign, many economists, government officials and business executives say, that the strongest days of the recovery from the 1991 recession may be in the past."

NAPLES, Italy -- Describing the toll of unemployed in their countries as an "unacceptable waste," leaders of the Group of Seven leading industrial democracies agreed yesterday to pursue policies to keep a nascent economic recovery on track, encourage growth and create jobs.Then, joined by President Boris N. Yeltsin of Russia, they turned to global political problems, though their talks were overshadowed by the death of the president of North Korea, Kim Il Sung, and uncertainty about his country's plans to develop nuclear weapons.

WASHINGTON -- With the economic recovery only sputtering along, the congressional Joint Economic Committee called on the Federal Reserve yesterday to "cooperate" with the Clinton deficit-reduction plan by keeping interests rates low.Fearful that the proposed $496 billion in tax increases and spending cuts over the next five years could hamper growth, the committee said in its annual report on the economy that "the primary responsibility for ensuring an...

ST. LOUIS -- Like a master traveling salesman with a suitcase full of potent if bitter elixirs, President Clinton hit the road yesterday hoping to persuade the American people that his prescription of spending cuts and tax increases would fix the ailing economy.Fresh from Wednesday night's address outlining his strategy for economic recovery -- and hoping to capitalize on public goodwill reflected in overnight polls -- Mr. Clinton plunged right into the heartland and, appropriately, right into a shopping mall to sell his wares.

Hopes that economic recovery will be quick or easy have been shadowed by a fresh flood of bad news. The housing market continues to stumble lower, construction of new homes fell sharply last month, and foreclosures surged in the first quarter. In Maryland, an array of companies announced continuing layoffs this week and General Growth Properties, owner of the Rouse malls and developments, filed for bankruptcy court protection. The bad news is a reminder that the clock is running on the Obama administration's effort to jump-start the economy.

Americans hate taxes but, truth be told, these days they are more afraid of depression. So while Republicans are trying to move the masses toward tax rebellion with tea parties today in Annapolis and elsewhere intended to remind us of the pre-Revolutionary dumping of taxed British tea in Boston Harbor, they are unlikely to create much of a stir. For one thing, many American taxpayers are enjoying a nice tax cut this year - part of the effort to spur the lagging economy. For another, people are willing to accept a ballooning federal deficit if it means saving jobs and promoting an economic recovery.

Americans want help, not more government There is a reason I have seen the word "selling" appear more than once in headlines about President Barack Obama traveling across the country to solicit support for the proposed economic stimulus package: Americans are not embracing this huge government expansion and need to be convinced that this program is in their best interest ("Pressure mounts on lawmakers as Obama begins selling stimulus to public," Feb....

How do you spend an estimated $775 billion over two years without wasting money? That's the challenge President-elect Barack Obama has been struggling with in recent days as he assembled pieces of the economic recovery plan he is expected to present to Congress later this week. Economists of every stripe have urged that Congress quickly enact a massive short-term spending program to propel the economy out of a deepening recession that threatens to produce double-digit unemployment by the end of this year.

LIMA, Peru - President Bush and other world leaders vowed yesterday to act "quickly and decisively" to battle the global economic crisis, as a 21-nation summit predicted worldwide recovery in 18 months. But the final declaration from the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation forum was short on specifics, beyond a vow by participating nations to avoid pressures to implement "protectionist" measures, such as import restrictions. "We are convinced that we can overcome this crisis in a period of eighteen months," the leaders concluded in a forecast added to a statement originally issued Saturday.

As the price of crude oil approaches record highs, the impact is beginning to flow far beyond the corner gas station. It's slicing through the economy, cutting into corporate profits, raising the cost of food, airline tickets, delivery services and countless other products. The cost of petroleum-based consumer goods -- everything from plastic wrap to Goretex to aspirin, luggage, surfboards and nylon stockings -- is expected to rise. Combined with record gasoline prices at the pumps, the spreading energy inflation means that Americans will have less spending power -- which is likely to dampen the economic recovery, experts say. For every $5 per barrel increase in the price of oil, roughly half a percentage point is shaved from the U.S. gross domestic product, economists say. Currently, that would be about $55 billion a year in lost production.

U.S. employment barely budged last month, an economic problem for the 8.2 million people out of work and a political predicament for a president who doesn't want to end up in the same situation. About 21,000 jobs were created in February, the Labor Department said yesterday, a sixth the size of economists' forecasts. The unemployment rate remained at 5.6 percent as 392,000 people dropped out of the labor force, just as the presidential campaign kicked into high gear. The Labor Department, which originally estimated an increase of 112,000 jobs in January, also revised that number downward, to 97,000.

ATLANTA - Dissembling on the campaign trail is always easy. So, for the two viable Democratic presidential candidates, it must be tempting to distort, to disguise, to demagogue, to look into the faces of desperate, jobless workers and pledge to fix everything - to bring back the good-paying jobs at American auto plants, to restore textile jobs by stopping Wal-Mart from importing bras from China, to penalize American credit card companies that send their...

President Bush delivered an upbeat report on the economy to Congress yesterday, declaring that his tax cuts have spurred steady growth, which he expects will create 2.6 million new jobs this year. The buoyant forecast surprised economists who gave Bush credit for spurring an economic recovery but labeled as unlikely the creation of so many jobs this year. "That would be quite a trick," said Anirban Basu, chairman and chief executive of Optimal Solutions Group LLC, a Baltimore economic consulting firm.

A raft of positive economic news sent stocks up across the board yesterday, and the Dow Jones industrial average shot to its highest close in 19 months as investors gained confidence that the economic recovery is firmly under way and the conflict in Iraq is going better. The Dow, an index of 30 blue-chip stocks, jumped 102.82 points, or 1 percent, to close at 10,248.08. The index is up 22.85 percent for the year, and has risen 465 points since the month began. It was the second 100-plus point gain of the week.