American Trucking Association: For-Hire Truck Tonnage Index fell 2.7 percent in August, which was the largest month-to-month decrease since March 2009.

More exciting news regarding Summer Recovery

courtesy of the American Trucking Association.

ARLINGTON, VA — The American Trucking Associations’ advance seasonally adjusted (SA) For-Hire Truck Tonnage Index fell 2.7 percent in August, which was the largest month-to-month decrease since March 2009. The latest drop lowered the SA index from 110 (2000=100) in July to 106.9 in August.

The not seasonally adjusted index, which represents the change in tonnage actually hauled by the fleets before any seasonal adjustment, equaled 113.5 in August, up 3.2 percent from the previous month.

Compared with August 2009, SA tonnage climbed 2.9 percent, which was well below July’s 7.4 percent year-over-year gain. Year-to-date, tonnage is up 6.2 percent compared with the same period in 2009.

ATA Chief Economist Bob Costello said that August’s data highlights that the economy, while still growing, is slowing. “We fully anticipate sluggish economic growth for the remainder of this year and the latest tonnage numbers are reflecting that slowdown.” However, Costello believes that the trucking environment has changed dramatically. “While I’d much rather see better tonnage figures, motor carriers can now do better with small increases in demand since so much supply left the industry during the recession.”

Note on the impact of trucking company failures on the index: Each month, ATA asks its membership the amount of tonnage each carrier hauled, including all types of freight. The indexes are calculated based on those responses. The sample includes an array of trucking companies, ranging from small fleets to multi-billion dollar carriers. When a company in the sample fails, we include its final month of operation and zero it out for the following month, with the assumption that the remaining carriers pick up that freight. As a result, it is close to a net wash and does not end up in a false increase. Nevertheless, some carriers are picking up freight from failures, and it may have boosted the index. Due to our correction mentioned above, however, it should be limited.

Trucking serves as a barometer of the U.S. economy, representing 68 percent of tonnage carried by all modes of domestic freight transportation, including manufactured and retail goods.

Trucks hauled 8.8 billion tons of freight in 2009. Motor carriers collected $544.4 billion, or 81.9 percent of total revenue earned by all transport modes.

ATA calculates the tonnage index based on surveys from its membership and has been doing so since the 1970s. This is a preliminary figure and subject to change in the final report issued around the 10th day of the month. The report includes month-to-month and year-over-year results, relevant economic comparisons, and key financial indicators.

The American Trucking Associations (www.truckline.com) is the largest national trade association for the trucking industry. Through a federation of other trucking groups, industry-related conferences, and its 50 affiliated state trucking associations, ATA represents more than 37,000 members covering every type of motor carrier in the United States. Follow ATA on Twitter @TruckingMatters (www.twitter.com/truckingmatters), or become a fan on Facebook (http://tinyurl.com/y4qwp6h).

Last Train Home: Documentary on Chinese Laborers

Chicago Sun Times:

These are the most hard-working people you will ever see. These are the most unselfish people you will ever see. They are not heroes. They simply are doing what they must. There are no jobs in the villages they grew up in. Their families strain in poverty. The choice is to stay put and starve, or go away and make money to send home so those left behind can eat. They have no choice. They did not choose to be heroic.

Every spring, China’s cities are plunged into chaos, as all at once, a tidal wave of humanity attempts to return home by train. It is the Chinese New Year. The wave is made up of millions of migrant factory workers. The homes they seek are the rural villages and families they left behind to seek work in the booming coastal cities. It is an epic spectacle that tells us much about China, a country discarding traditional ways as it hurtles towards modernity and global economic dominance.

Last Train Home, an emotionally engaging and visually beautiful debut film from Chinese-Canadian director Lixin Fan, draws us into the fractured lives of a single migrant family caught up in this desperate annual migration. Sixteen years ago, the Zhangs abandoned their young children to find work in the city, consoled by the hope that their wages would lift their children into a better life. But in a bitter irony, the Zhangs’ hopes for the future are undone by their very absence. Qin, the child they left behind, has grown into adolescence crippled by a sense of abandonment. In an act of teenage rebellion, she drops out of school. She too will become a migrant worker. The decision is a heartbreaking blow for the parents. In classic cinema verité style, Last Train Home follows the Zhangs’ attempts to change their daughter’s course and repair their ruptured family. Intimate and candid, the film paints a human portrait of the dramatic changes sweeping China. We identify with the Zhangs as they navigate through the stark and difficult choices of a society caught between old ways and new realities. Can they get ahead and still undo some of the damage that has been done to their family?

Thanks to Business Insider for the post and a special thanks to Steve Hsu for the original post. Link to: Steve Hsu Blog and lik to Documentary Site

Chinese data suggest further slowing for economy...oh no, weren't they supposed to save the globe?

LOS ANGELES (MarketWatch) -- Chinese consumer and wholesale prices rose less than expected, while industrial output and retail sales eased, pointing to a slowing in the economy.

The consumer price index for July was 3.3% higher than a year earlier, while the producer price index was up 4.8%, the National Bureau of Statistics said Wednesday.

The CPI was expected to rise 3.4% and PPI tipped to gain 5.4%, according to a Dow Jones Newswires survey.

The CPI result marked an acceleration from June's 2.9% rise, but the PPI inflation eased from the prior month's 6.4%. The CPI increase was due in large part to a 6.8% gain in food prices.

Industrial output for the month was up 13.4% year-on-year, below June's 13.7% increase but above expectations for a 13.2% rise, according to separate surveys by Dow Jones Newswires and Reuters.

Retail sales rose 17.9% year-on-year, slowing from June's 18.3% rise and well below Reuters' surveyed forecast of 18.4%.

"Everyone Is So Bullish": Why Peter Boockvar Is Still Bearish on America

Tech Ticker
August 3, 2010

The International Monetary Fund may be predicting a gradual economic recovery for the U.S. but there's nothing gradual about the way stocks are rallying. The Dow Jones Industrial Average just capped its best monthly gain since 2002 and the S&P 500's rallied more than 12% since July 10th.

Have we gone too far, too fast?

Peter Boockvar, equity strategist for Miller Tabak thinks so. "Right now everyone is so bullish after a 50% rally. That should be concerning," he says.

   He's bearish on the U.S. markets for two primary reasons:

   Too much debt both at the consumer and federal level will stunt growth.

The eventual unwinding of our current fiscal policy will be painful. In the meantime, that same fiscal policy has the ability to prop up the market. As he puts it, "when you’re in a money printing world we’re in right now asset prices can lift."

Boockvar favors international markets. "I've been bullish on commodities, emerging markets that produce commodities and Asia - particularly China, that has driven the rally in commodities," he says. Admittedly, China may be due for a pullback after an 87% run up in the Shanghai Composite this year. If that happens Boockvar's confident the "U.S. will be following."

China manufacturing contracts in July: HSBC survey

By Michael Kitchen LOS ANGELES (MarketWatch) 

One of two key gauges of China's manufacturing sector registered a contraction in July, the first such pull-back since March 2009. Reported results from the HSBC China Manufacturing Purchasing Managers Index for July, released Monday, fell to 49.4, down from 50.4 in June and below the important 50-point level that separates expansion from contraction.

The PMI survey, formerly conducted by broker CSLA, last showed a contraction in March 2009. A rival survey, released Sunday by the Chinese government's China Federation of Logistics and Purchasing, fell to 51.2, down from 52.1 in June.

Grandpa: OH NO, conflicting economic data! It would never happen in a Democracy like the United States of America. Might China be experiencing early signs of Bernanke-itis (a.k.a. "unusual uncertainty")? I thought China was going to pull the entire globe out of the economic gutter. Do not worry, CNBC will present a positive spin before the opening bell as they have all night to crunch copy.