As the economy emerged from 2005, the signals indicate that it is still growing, but more slowly. Already the ISM Manufacturing survey dropped a few points, but is still firmly in growth territory. What is more interesting is how little positive press coverage there is about the economy. This should be a warning to us: when the economy slows slightly, or even declines slightly, it may be reported as disastrous, even though it is just slow.

One reason for this kind of coverage may be that the publishing industry is not doing well in this strong economy. Back in the mid to late 1990s, publishing was booming as Internet bubble money was being spent wildly in a misguided attempt to build mindshare (getting profitable sales with real products would have been smarter). The publishing business was booming; hence, almost every story you read about the economy seemed to be positive. This story in Slate gives an indication as to what might be on writers' minds as they are confronted by economic news. Their personal economies, in the form of wages that haven’t kept up with the market and concern about job security, is perhaps taking up more of their bandwidth than the macroeconomic story.

Today, inflation is low, interest rates are low despite the Fed increases, household wealth is at an all-time high (that's net household wealth, which means that credit cards and other debt are already excluded), the percentage of families with household incomes above an inflation-adjusted $50,000 is at an all-time high, home ownership is at an all-time high, stock ownership now numbers 70% of all households, the civilian employed labor force is at an all-time high, the unemployment rate is smack in the middle of the full employment range of 4%-6%, an average of more than 70,000 net new businesses are being formed every month, and economic growth is running above post-WW2 historical averages. How come we never read about that?