January 1, 2026 • 36 mins
Kevin explains the 12 Days of Christmas. He also looks at the evolution of New Year's celebrations. Kevin looks at what 2026 holds for the economy with Phil Flynn of Market Insights.
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Speaker 1 (00:10):
This is America's Truncking Network with Kevin Gordon.
Speaker 2 (00:14):
Welcome aboard, thanks for tuning in. Happy New Year, January first,
twenty twenty six. It's also the eighth day of Christmas.
I want to start off thanking all you truckers out
there on the highway tonight, not being at home with
your families, not being able to celebrate the coming.
Speaker 1 (00:35):
Of the new year, the New Year's Eve.
Speaker 2 (00:37):
Celebrations and so on, because you are busy out there
keeping the wheels of this economy rolling. Also first responders,
everybody that's on the clock.
Speaker 1 (00:48):
Thank you to the police and.
Speaker 2 (00:49):
Fire, hospital workers, people that are there taking care of patients,
food service employees all around the area, across the nation, Hotel,
motel workers, what people are traveling, You've got to be
taken care of. You've got to make sure that the
people in the hotels are there. Store clerks, convenience store employees.
(01:09):
As you're out there driving around and stopping by gas stations,
take the time to say thank you to.
Speaker 1 (01:16):
Those people, to those people that.
Speaker 2 (01:18):
Are working and thank that just say thank you for
being here. I mentioned this is the eighth to day
of Christmas. Again, if you've been listening to the program
of beginning. Well, I've talked about on Christmas Day, the
fact that there's a misconception that the twelve days of
Christmas are actually the twelve days before Christmas, that is,
(01:42):
actually the days before Christmas is what is referred to
well in Christian circles as the ads the advent period.
It is the fourth Sunday you go back for Sundays
before Christmas, and that is the gearing up and preparation
for Advent than the twelve days of Christmas.
Speaker 1 (02:01):
Then begin.
Speaker 2 (02:03):
December fifth or twenty fifth, rather Christmas Day, and then
go for twelve days until the twelfth night of January
the fifth, and then on January the sixth is the
celebration of the Epiphany, which is traditionally or through biblical accounts,
when the Majei the three Wise Men visited Jesus, Mary,
(02:27):
and Joseph. And so that has to do with the
actual Christmas season itself and is kind of a misconception.
And by the way, we've talked about this several times
over the last week, So if you missed any part
of that or missed any of our shows, make sure
you hit up that iHeartRadio app and everything's right there,
of course, brought to you by our friends at Rush
Truck Centers. Now, as far as New Year's is concerned,
(02:51):
the New Year Day itself, I love digging into some
of these traditions and kind of a lighthearted type of thing,
kind of light loosen things up or lighting things up.
Today looking at the traditions and how this formulation, I'm
always fascinated by how things develop, why things are the
way they are, how certain words came together, what their
(03:12):
meanings are, where they first appeared, and so on.
Speaker 1 (03:16):
This is something that just always fascinates me.
Speaker 2 (03:18):
Sivils civilizations around the world celebrating the start of each
new year, or at least have been doing this for
at least for millennia four thousand years.
Speaker 1 (03:29):
Today.
Speaker 2 (03:29):
Most New Year's celebrations begin, of course, last night to
some of the thirty first New Year's Eve and the
last day of the Georgian calendar, and continue for the
early hours of January the first, So people are still
out there having a great time reveling in the new
year while we're here talking to each other here on
(03:51):
the radio. Common traditions include attending parties, eating special New
Year's foods, making resolutions for the new year and watching
fire works displays. Now going back in history, the earliest
recorded festivities in honor of new Year's date back more
than four thousand years to the ancient Babylon. For the Babylonians,
(04:11):
the first moon following the vernal equinox the day in
late March and again in March, not January. In March,
when an equal amount of sunlight and darkness heralded the
start of a new year, they marked the occasion with
massive religious festival called a key to, derived from the
Samarian word for barley, which was cut in the spring
(04:34):
and involved the traditional ritual for last about eleven days. Again,
you know, festivities back then lasted for a long period
of time in order for to realign the Roman calendar
throughout the anti Let me skip getting ahead of myself here.
Throughout antiquity, civilization around the world developed increasingly sophisticated calendars,
(04:57):
typically pinning the first day of the year to the
agri culture or astronomical event.
Speaker 1 (05:02):
In Egypt, for instance, the year.
Speaker 2 (05:06):
Began with the annual flooding of the Nile, which coincided
with the rising of the stars serious the first.
Speaker 1 (05:13):
Day of the lunar new year.
Speaker 2 (05:14):
Meanwhile, occurred with the second new moon after the winter solstice.
So going back to even Egypt, they had a different
way of determining when the new year was after the
centuries the calendar.
Speaker 1 (05:27):
Let me see early. I'm sorry, let's go here.
Speaker 2 (05:29):
The early Roman calendar consisted of ten months and three
hundred and four days, with each new year beginning in
the vernal equinox. According to tradition, it was created by Romulus,
the founder of Rome, in the eighth century. Over the centuries,
calendars fell out of sync these old calendars with the sun.
Speaker 1 (05:52):
In sync with the sun, and in.
Speaker 2 (05:53):
Forty six BC, Julius Caesar decided to solve the problem.
By consulting with the most prominent astronomers and mathematicians of
his time, he introduced the Julian calendar, which closely resembles
the more modern Gregorian calendar that most countries around.
Speaker 1 (06:11):
The world use today.
Speaker 2 (06:13):
As part of his reform, Caesar instituted January first is
the first day of the year, and that is pretty
much caught on in terms of the celebrations. Tod of
the month's name Janus, the Roman god of beginnings, whose
two faces allow him to look back in the past
and forward to the future. Now New Year's traditions and
(06:33):
celebrations around the world previously mentioned going on for four
thousand years. Revelers enjoy snacks for good luck. In Spain
several other Spanish speaking countries, people bolt down a dozen grapes,
symbolizing their hopes of the months ahead right before midnight.
In many parts of the world, traditional New Year's dishes
(06:56):
feature legoomes, which are thought to resemble coins and herald
future financial success. Now I land to look this up,
excuse me. Legomes basically include lentils. In Italy, black eyed
peas and southern states. Also beans, peas, chickpeas, and soybeans
(07:20):
are considered these legomes, so they resemble coins and are
supposed to be doing with wealth.
Speaker 1 (07:26):
I found this fascinating.
Speaker 2 (07:28):
Because pigs represent progress and prosperity in some cultures. Pork
appears on the New Year's eve table in Cuba, Austria, Hungary,
Portugal and other countries. Now I thought that was kind
of weird in terms of pigs being symbol of progress,
But it goes back to if you look at chickens,
(07:49):
if you look at cows and horses, how they scratch
the earth. They are always doing it in a backwards
motion pigs because the way they root, they actually put
their snoot down and actually push forward to scratch the earth,
and so a symbol of progress going forward instead of backwards.
(08:10):
Of course, ring shaped cakes, pastries sign of the year, continuing.
Speaker 1 (08:14):
As far as what Mexico and elsewhere.
Speaker 2 (08:16):
In Sweden and Norway. Meanwhile, rice pudding with almond inside
is served. Whoever finds that almonds can expect twelve months
of good luck. Let's see what other things other customers
are coming around the world. Of course, watching fireworks, all
lang sign the all traditions that we do here in
the United States, and so a lot of traditions. And
(08:39):
I always, again, like I said, I always geek out
on these kind of things. I always find it fascinating
how traditions begin, how they evolve over the period of time,
why they started in the first place, and just you know,
how things happen and evolved. I just always find that
very interesting. Coming up, we're going to be speaking with
Phil Flynn. Of course, he is Price Futures Group.
Speaker 1 (09:02):
We quote him very often on this program.
Speaker 2 (09:05):
And he is the author of the Energy Report. He
is a frequent contributor to Fox Business News as well
as once in a while on the Fox Weather Channel.
So looking forward to talking with him, talking about some
of the things going on in the economy and kind
of gear up for what we can expect in the
(09:25):
new year. I'm Kevin Gordon, America's struck In Network seven
hundred WLW.
Speaker 1 (09:32):
I want to.
Speaker 2 (09:32):
Welcome back to the program Phil Flynn. He is the
senior analyst Price Futures Group, author of the Energy Report,
and a contributor to Fox Business News. And I've actually
seen him on the Fox Weather Channel. Phil, Welcome to
the program, or welcome back to the program.
Speaker 3 (09:48):
Hey kick, Hey, thank you Kevin. So this is day
five of Christmas. Do I get five golden rings for
being here?
Speaker 1 (09:56):
Yes? Absolutely, absolutely.
Speaker 2 (10:00):
Good.
Speaker 3 (10:00):
With the way the gold prices are going today, that's
going to be pretty good. But oh man, I've been
watching the sewer market for the last twenty Oh my gosh,
it's unlike anything I've ever seen before. I mean, we
hit a record high last night eighty four dollars. We
fallowed ten dollars and ounce, and even with that volatility,
(10:21):
we're still cheap compared to gold. So the precious metals
have been unbelievable.
Speaker 1 (10:26):
Absolutely. Well, by the way, how is your Christmas?
Speaker 3 (10:29):
It was wonderful. I must have got on the nice list.
Thanks for whatever you did.
Speaker 2 (10:34):
Well, it was because of all your fantastic reporting and
all of the stuff that you talk about in terms
of your energy report and the economy.
Speaker 1 (10:42):
I'll tell you what, this economy is on fire.
Speaker 2 (10:48):
And what I'm seeing is that the only in my opinion,
the only thing holding it back are these interest rates
that I think people are sitting on the sidelines and saying, gee,
do I make this investment? Do I do this so
I incur that amount of money with a return on
investment and so on. But I mean, you look at
I mean, every time we turn around, there's a report
(11:08):
that comes out, retail sales higher than expected, unemployment lower
than expect. We had that jobs report on well, I
guess it was Wednesday day early, the initial job is
claims less than expected. And yet we have this drum
beat from the spoon feder regurgitators in the mainstream media
that we're actually on the precipice of a recession, and
(11:31):
in my opinion, they're trying to manufacture a recession.
Speaker 4 (11:34):
You know, I think you're right.
Speaker 3 (11:35):
You know, a lot of times, you know, the mainstream press.
You know, it's amazing some of the people that they
have on the mainstream press really don't understand the economics.
And I think you see that more and more when
you see the type of questions you get. For example,
one of the things that bothered me is when the
mainstream press is saying, no, as soon as Donald Trump
(11:57):
puts on sanctions, we're going to go on through a
recession and an inflation is going to go through the roof.
And of course that hasn't happened, you know, if you
look at the historically inflationary Yeah.
Speaker 2 (12:10):
Yeah, well, and credit to you, and then credit to
my economics professor. Way back in the day when I
was at Xavier University. One of the things that was
talked about the tariffs were the main driving force of
income to the United States and it was only in
the period of after the war World War two that
tariffs on our goods going into the other countries kind
(12:32):
of a protectionism mechanism for them. But the tariffs necessarily
don't lead to inflation. And I think you was that
Kevin O'Leary, Larry Kudlow and a couple of people in
Fox business are some of the only people that I
have heard other than you know, you and me saying
that tariffs don't lead to inflation. It's out of control
government spending.
Speaker 4 (12:52):
It's absolutely correct. That's in fact, that's the only way
that cause inflation. And listen, when.
Speaker 3 (12:57):
There's tariffs to some prices go up. They absolutely do.
But I can give you for every price increase, I
can give you a price decrease as well. And we
saw that for example, you know, in the price of grains.
You know, the farmers don't like to hear that, obviously,
but that's the truth. And grain prices went down when
we had tariffs. So yeah, for every increase, there's a decrease.
(13:19):
And what we're finding right now is that it's actually
lowering inflation because when we take in more money to
the government, it reduces our deficit, and when we have
a smaller deficit, the government has to borrow less money.
We're already seeing that. And when we borrow less money,
we don't have to tax people as much to pay
for it, and we don't have to print as much
(13:39):
money to pay our bills.
Speaker 4 (13:41):
So you get into it, you're going to have to
that's amazing.
Speaker 2 (13:43):
You're going to have to talk slower because there's a
lot of my frontemies that listen to this program and
they're liberals, so they may not understand that real quick.
Speaker 1 (13:53):
So not just.
Speaker 2 (13:55):
You know, they don't understand as you said, they don't
understand economic and so the things that you just said,
you would think it would be common sense, but apparently not.
Speaker 3 (14:07):
Well, the news is, I think liberals are still sleepy,
most of them at the tower. I don't know for sure,
that could be a guest. No, No, I think you're right,
you know, and and it's it's hard to you know,
I you know, I think sometimes I think when you
hear you know, people on the other side when they
talk about uh economics, it's about emotional economics, It's like, okay,
(14:29):
well you know that, you know, they're you know, Elion
Musk is a billionaire.
Speaker 4 (14:33):
You know, everything's wrong with the economy.
Speaker 3 (14:35):
He or you know, it's like, okay, this guy, you know,
invented a rocket to go to Mars. You know, he
invented electric car industry, which wouldn't exist if if if
it wasn't for his genius, you know. And but then
of course they want to tell everybody to buy electric cars,
enforcing to buy cars. U listen, I mean the whole
thing when you look at the emotional side of economics.
(14:56):
I think we have to try to remove the politics
from thatomics, which is really hard to do because I
think a lot of these politicians on the other side,
you know, keep trying to tell us, hey, the economy's bad,
the economy's bad, you know when and it's all Trump's fault,
you know, when you know the previous administration, you know,
was there for four years and ran up, you know,
(15:17):
some of the biggest debt and inflation numbers in history.
So you know, yeah, they blamed COVID, but you know,
we know what really caused it, and that's out of
control spending.
Speaker 1 (15:26):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (15:26):
I mean, we had the Inflation Reduction Act that added
billions of actually trillions of dollars to the deficit. We
had the government subsidies that that latest round of well,
we had the what was it the what was it
the Green New Steel Bill that went through that it
was was it the Inflation Reduction Act or something else
(15:48):
that was supposed to be all this but it was
all this green technology that they wanted to fund and
a slush fund for them, which was out of control spending.
But when you look at what has gone on, I mean,
when Trump left office, inflation was at one point four percent,
the thirty year fixed rate was somewhere around two point
(16:08):
eight seven thereabouts, and people were making money, people wages
were higher, was out pacing inflation. And then the first
year of the Biden administration, boom. We're up to two
point five, two point six, up to nine point one
percent in June of twenty twenty two. Gasoline prices up
to five dollars a gallon, and all of a sudden,
(16:30):
the guys that broke the system, they're going to tell
us how to fix it.
Speaker 3 (16:35):
Yeah, it's pretty amazing, right, It pretty is, you know.
I mean, and when you think about, you know, some
of the things that President Trump said when it came
into office, one of them was energy. Right, We're going
to make gasoline prices cheap. And people say you can't
do that, you know, but President Trump did it. And
I think it's a combination of smart economic policy, smart
(16:56):
drill baby drill policy.
Speaker 4 (16:58):
But also politics.
Speaker 3 (17:01):
Right by neutralizing Iran, you know, by showing strength against Venezuela,
by you know, really getting control of the geopolitical picture.
You know, even the peace talks between Russia and Ukraine
wherever they go anywhere or not. All of this has
reduced the risk premium to oil. And I can't tell
(17:21):
you what leadership means when you talk to a barrel oil.
When the market's confident that we have a leader in
place that is not going to allow you know, major
oil price disruption. You know, a president that is not
going to sit back and allow Hooti rebels to start
taking over oil tankers. You know, that's a huge change
to the market and that shows up in the price.
(17:42):
And I think that's one of the unheralded successes when
it comes to these low oil prices.
Speaker 2 (17:48):
Yeah, that war premium that you were talking about, a
risk premium that has been one of the major considerations.
I mean, every time there was some sort of disruption,
the Huti rebels trying to choke off the straits and
form those seeking ships in the Red Sea and so on,
oil tankers and such and trying to choke trade. That
is a risk premium. And when you don't have that
(18:10):
risk premium, the free flow of trade. And we're not
talking about just well, we're talking about free trade, but
we're also talking about fair trade as opposed to these
talking about these tariffs. It kind of gives everything a
more level playing field. And I think what people.
Speaker 3 (18:25):
Are go ahead, Yeah, no, I'm gonna Figu're absolutely right now.
I think you know, when we get back to the
level of pay. Listen, I'm a free market guy.
Speaker 4 (18:34):
You know that, Kevin.
Speaker 3 (18:35):
I would love a world with no tariffs, right, you know,
and I would love a war with peace and love
and rock and roll and all that stuff, you know.
But you know, we've got to face reality. I mean,
in the real world, you know, every other country had
tariffs on us, and we were trying to be the
nice guy, right, and by being the nice guy, we
gave up so many jobs, so many factories, you know,
(18:57):
we lost so many industries overseas. Right, And so now
we're going back to a policy that stands up to
that in the real world. Right, when you stand up
to you know, countries like China that steal our intellectual
property or steal our businesses or steal you know that
kind of thing, and people say, oh my gosh, well
you know what's going to happen.
Speaker 4 (19:17):
You know, all the goods we're getting from China. People
are going to you know, we're going to you know,
they're going to cost so much more.
Speaker 3 (19:22):
And it's like there's so many goods from China that
we buy that the only reason we buy them is
because they're so darn cheap. And the reason why they're
so cheap, you know, they're using cheap labor, they're using
you know, cheap you know, materials, and if they try
to raise the prices on those things, nobody's going to
buy it. People are going to buy you know, name
brand goods as opposed to Chinese knockoffs.
Speaker 1 (19:43):
Yeah, exactly.
Speaker 2 (19:44):
I mean when you look at the average what is it,
the average salary in the United States factory workers, et cetera.
Is somewhere around thirty seven dollars per hour when you
add in the benefits and so on. And then you
go over to China, they have no benefits whatsoever, and
average hourly wages five to seven dollars. There's no vacation time,
(20:05):
there's none of the employee benefits. Of course, the wages
are going to be cheaper, and yet there's this big
gap between what they manufacture and then what they sell,
and of course that can be eaten into.
Speaker 1 (20:19):
By these as.
Speaker 2 (20:20):
I think you pointed out in your energy report that
the tariffs are absorbed by the manufacturer, the import or
the exporter, the importer, the wholesaler, and in some cases
the retailer. So there's all these levels where those tariffs
can be absorbed that it doesn't hit us at the
(20:40):
level at the consumer level. And we've seen that as
far as inflation is concerned.
Speaker 3 (20:45):
No, you're absolutely right. And listen, you're going to hear
from some buyers of Chinese goods saying, hey, we're going
to have to raise prices because of tariffs, right, I mean, yeah,
that's going to happen to a certain degree. But what
you're also going to see on the flip side of that,
other goods are going to go down in price, right
because they have to move goods, and you know, and
(21:05):
and then you're going to see alternatives become more competitive.
Speaker 4 (21:09):
Right.
Speaker 3 (21:09):
So you know, for example, I think everybody was outraged
because we were going to put a tariff on you know,
European pastas. Oh my gosh, we can't get we can't
get our pastas from you know, and it's like wait
a second, you know, it's how do you make pasta
like flour and water, you know, don't we have companies
in America because they can figure out how to do that.
(21:30):
You know, we really need it from Italy.
Speaker 4 (21:32):
I mean, yeah, it.
Speaker 3 (21:33):
Looks kind of nice and the boxes are pretty, but
I think we make as good as pasta in America.
Speaker 4 (21:38):
I say, buy America a positive.
Speaker 2 (21:40):
Yeah, and we didn't see a click break. Can you
hang with us through the break and we'll pick up
on the other side, all right? I guess is also
I should have mentioned that several times during this segment,
but I apologize for Phil Flint, Price Futures Group and
author of the Energy Report. I'm Kevin Gordon, America struck
In Network seven hundred w L, continuing our conversation with
(22:02):
Phil Flynn. He is senior market analyst Price Futures Group,
author of the Energy Report, and contributed to Fox Business Net. Phil,
thanks for hanging with us through the break. When we
were talking earlier about inflation and where we're seeing that,
I thought it was interesting and again, being a recovering accountant,
I just have to dig into the numbers and when
(22:23):
I see some of these reports come out, and it
was a few months ago or a couple months ago
when inflation ticked up. But when you got behind the numbers,
one of the largest increases was in the service sector
and was the fees being charged by brokers. And it's
a good thing, but a bad thing because the market
(22:45):
was so good, many people were coming into the market,
but then the fees on that were increasing because there
were so many more fees collected, not higher amounts, but
more people. And that was a factor for the inflation.
But nobody is really talking about. You know, when you
had ups contracts, the railroad contracts, the UAW contracts, who
(23:07):
else am I missing here?
Speaker 1 (23:09):
Up?
Speaker 2 (23:10):
Anyway, all these the east coast, West coast ports, they
got big boosts in terms of their wages. That's got
to affect our economy and that's got to be causing
a little bit of inflation.
Speaker 3 (23:24):
It is, there's no doubt about that. And you know,
when the economy grows, demand goes and that's it. And
we had what the incredible four point three growth number
in the US, which was blue away expectations right exactly,
and that you know, should put the naysayers to bed.
Speaker 1 (23:42):
But no, it won't, No, it won't.
Speaker 3 (23:46):
But yeah, I mean the economy is doing great in
so many cylinderies now.
Speaker 4 (23:50):
Listen.
Speaker 3 (23:50):
I know there's a lot of people listening today and say, well,
wait a second, Phil, don't you eat do you go
to the grocery store? I mean, those prices are still high,
and people are right, I mean, but there are some
prices in the grocery stores that are going to come down,
but there are some that are hot going to remain high,
not because of just inflation, just because of cycles.
Speaker 1 (24:14):
Right.
Speaker 3 (24:15):
For example, we had the smallest cattle crop we've had,
you know.
Speaker 4 (24:18):
In a hundred years, right.
Speaker 3 (24:20):
Because of drought and other issues. You know, so those
prices it's going to take longer to rebuild that herd,
you know. But if you look on the flip side
of that, grain prices are historically low, so you're going
to have you know, lower food costs there. You're seeing.
You remember, everybody was worried about aiding prices. Aid prices
are coming down, you know. So it's going to be
bumpy on the food side here for a little bit.
(24:43):
But we see the trend is going to be down.
Speaker 4 (24:45):
There's going to be.
Speaker 3 (24:45):
Certain certain commodities that aren't going.
Speaker 4 (24:48):
To get cheap soon.
Speaker 3 (24:49):
It's going to take a long time, but you're going
to start finding more value at the grocery store over
the next year, you know, except for a.
Speaker 2 (24:56):
Are starting to see it a little bit. I mean
where I live, of course, we experience or we luck out.
And the fact that we've got like five different grocery
store chains that are in the area, so they compete
hot and heavy with each other. And I noticed that
there are certain prices. If you look at their flyers
and their ads, there are certain prices. Every three weeks,
(25:17):
this price is down. Like coffee. Coffee I drink is
usually fourteen ninety nine a can, but when it's on sale,
it's nine to ninety nine, so you buy it. When
it's nine to ninety nine, you buy two cans if
you're gonna you know. So I you know the grocery prices.
I think there's ways around them. I mean I noticed
my wife was telling me the other day she was
in the store and they had milk on sale for
(25:38):
a dollar thirty nine for a half a half a gallon,
and the gallons were over three dollars and people were
coming in grabbing the gallons. They were coming in and
grabbing this instead of paying attention to prices. It's is
grab and go mentality, I think where people are getting
hurt on their grocery prices.
Speaker 3 (25:56):
But yeah, I listen, I think that's true. I think
that's true. I mean listen.
Speaker 2 (26:00):
I mean I only got about a minute.
Speaker 1 (26:02):
I gotta get going here.
Speaker 3 (26:03):
But well, I want my potato chip bags as big
as it used to be. Well, yeah, I think the
trends are getting better. There'll be a few things, you know,
like coffee. You know, they had a terrible drought, worst crop, coco,
same thing. But they're coming back, so we'll see what happens.
Speaker 1 (26:21):
Phil.
Speaker 2 (26:21):
Thank you so much for spending time with us again.
Aren't my guest, Phil Flynn, Senior market analysts, Price Futures Group.
If you don't get his energy report, you got to.
I mean a lot of information in there, and a
lot of good economic data.
Speaker 4 (26:34):
Thank you, Kevin. The Happy New Year to you. I'm
everybody listening.
Speaker 2 (26:37):
Phil again, Thank you so much for spending time with us.
I certainly appreciate it. I'm Kevin Gordon, America's struck In
Network seven hundred w LW is to Phil Flynn for
joining us. Always enjoy talking to him. I'd love to
have him on the program and talk about things because once,
as I mentioned before, he and I aren sync years ago.
Speaker 1 (26:59):
A couple of years ago.
Speaker 2 (27:00):
Actually I started reading some different articles and he was quoted,
and so I figured, I got to get a hold
of this guy and you know, get together and talk
to him and have him on the program and talk
about some of the things going on in the economy
and thereabouts. So again my appreciation of Phil for being
with us yesterday. We got ahead of the normal Thursday
(27:24):
jobless claims that came out.
Speaker 1 (27:26):
Early because of the New Year holiday.
Speaker 2 (27:29):
And it was interesting looking at the different headlines. And again,
as I mentioned several times before, when I see these
different headlines, it's interesting that how the headline sometimes doesn't
match the story, or the headline tries to downplay what
is actually going on.
Speaker 1 (27:49):
Just give you an example.
Speaker 2 (27:50):
According to Action four x US, initial jobless claims fall
to one ninety nine versus expected two fifteen. Not a
bad headline. Reuters US weekly job as claims fall to
one month low. That's kind of so so good headline.
I saw jobless claims declined for third straight weeks, a
(28:12):
sign of steady labor market. That is actually from MarketWatch
dot com seeking alpha. Initial jobless claims surprise with another
drop this week and another very good headline from Investing
dot Com. Initial jobs claims dip, beating forecast and previous figures.
Let's dig into some of the numbers here and interesting
(28:36):
how this is being covered, how they decide to cover this,
and some of the comments that they make throughout.
Speaker 1 (28:43):
So let's just dig into the numbers here.
Speaker 2 (28:45):
How about that initial jobs claim is the number of
people who apply for state unemployment fell by sixteen thousand
to a seasonally adjusted one hundred and ninety nine thousand
in the weekend in December, The twenty seventh Favorite Department
said on Wednesday. The report came out early due to
the New Year holiday. It is the third straight week
(29:08):
decline in new claims and the seventh week in the
past eighth. While claims were often volatile during the holiday period,
economists say the record low level of claims is a
sign of a relatively steady labor market conditions. So what
have we been hearing. We've been hearing from Lion Jerry
(29:28):
Powell and the Federal Reserve that the job market is weak.
We have been hearing claims in terms of what the unemployment.
Speaker 1 (29:37):
Rate is that we'll be talking about here shortly.
Speaker 2 (29:40):
All we hear about is the job market not being
as strong, but indications of what we're getting from initial
jobless claims, continuing jobless claims. It all points to something
that is not what people are being told by the
spoon fed regurgitators in the mainstream media.
Speaker 1 (30:01):
What's ahead for let me see, let's see here we go.
Speaker 2 (30:04):
Economists pulled by the Wall Street Journal had estimated new
claims would rise to two hundred and twenty thousand from
the initial estimate last week of two hundred and fourteen.
Speaker 1 (30:15):
They were off by ten percent.
Speaker 2 (30:18):
And when I say economists, let's not forget one of
the phrases that was done by lords J.
Speaker 1 (30:26):
Peter.
Speaker 2 (30:26):
He's a Peter principal where people rise to their level
of incompetence, a comment that was made years ago. And
economists is an expert who will know tomorrow why the
things he predicted yesterday didn't happen today. And so many
times we see these estimates and these expectations from economists
that never really pan out.
Speaker 1 (30:49):
Some of the key details.
Speaker 2 (30:50):
A number of people already collecting unemployment benefits known as
continuing claims fell by forty seven thousand to one point
eighty seven million in the week ending December twentieth. Continuing
claims have risen in recent years, and I want to
repeat years, because this is one of the first times I've.
Speaker 1 (31:11):
Heard them put this in an article.
Speaker 2 (31:13):
Because they keep talking about continuing jobless claims increasing over
this past year to indicate that the soft unemployment, of
the soft employment number and a weak jobs market to
claim to bolster their narrative.
Speaker 1 (31:31):
So where were these reports.
Speaker 2 (31:33):
In recent years about unemployment going or unemployment claims continuing
to go up? Apparently they didn't want us to know
that during the last few years or recent years, as
they say here in the article The.
Speaker 1 (31:50):
Big Picture, although relieves that.
Speaker 2 (31:53):
Claims are low, many economists again the word economists, worry
about the slow pace of hiring, especial especially since the summer.
The unemployment rate rose to four point six percent in November,
the highest rate since this September twenty twenty one. Now
I doubt that number, seriously, I am not buying that.
(32:15):
Nothing I see supports that when you have initial jobless
claims all being within that range of two hundred and
ten thousand, and again, this is below two hundred and
ten thousand this week, down to one hundred ninety nine thousand.
But things have been going in that range of between
two hundred and ten thousand and two hundred and fifty
thousand on a weekly basis for the last several years,
(32:40):
so that number hasn't been going up. Now that people
continuing to collect unemployment, it has risen, but there's also
more people coming into the job market on a regular basis.
So I'm not sure. I can't wait to see when
these numbers are revised, because again they're going to be
I think the date that that's supposed to come out is, Yeah,
(33:00):
the December number on the unemployment rate will be out
on January of the ninth. Now, on this other article
that I saw a number of Americans filing applications, jobless
benefits fell unexpectedly last week. Now, again this goes back
to things I've been saying. How many times have we
seen the word unexpectedly in twenty twenty five? In this case,
(33:23):
jobless benefits fell unexpectedly, retail sales, home sales up unexpectedly.
Every time we turn around, you pick up a story
having to do with the economy, and things are unexpectedly
in the good direction and unexpectedly low in the bad direction.
So again I wonder where these people are coming from.
(33:45):
Misial job as claims again stated that they come in
at one hundred and ninety nine thousand. They had forecasted
two hundred and twenty. Again they were off by ten percent.
Let's see. Though the economy remains resilient, with gross domestic
product increasing at its fastest pace in two years in
the third quarter, the labor market has almost stalled. Labor
(34:08):
demand and supply have been impacted by import terriffs and
immigration crackdown. According to Economous Again, economists, while off their
recent peak, continuing claims are higher than they were at
this time last year, and that elevated level aligned with
the survey from the Conference Board last week showing consumer
(34:29):
perceptions of the labor market deteriorated this month to levels
last scene in twenty twenty one. Rick sand Telly I
mentioned him a few times, Rick Santelly back during the
housing crisis, when the housing market bottom fell out back
in two thousand and eight.
Speaker 1 (34:49):
Two thousand and nine, he was on.
Speaker 2 (34:51):
The floor of the New York Stock Exchange and when
it came out that this subprime loans had gotten out
of control, and how they things happened, that this was
something that should never have happened in terms of the
housing price or housing bubble busting.
Speaker 1 (35:07):
And he was there and he was very frustrated.
Speaker 2 (35:09):
He said, you know what we need in this country
is another tea party. And that's what formulated people saying,
you know what, He's right, let's go ahead and start
these tea party organizations to where you know, all these
politicians that kept telling us that, hey, don't worry about this,
we got it handled. All these people, both sides of
the don't worry about things, you know, just elect us.
(35:30):
We'll fix things or we'll keep things going on and
everything's will be okay. Then out of the blue, we
get these these numbers the tank the housing market where
houses lost about forty some percent, and so people started
going to meetings and going to city commissioners and starting
being active in politics, asking questions and saying.
Speaker 1 (35:53):
You know, you told us you had our backs.
Speaker 3 (35:56):
Well.
Speaker 2 (35:56):
Rick Antelly the other day was talking about what's going
on as far as the economy is concerned, and he said,
I'm going to paraphrase here, he said, you can take
all these opinion polls and all these things on surveys
as far as consumer confidence and whatnot. And you can
take a big shovel and shove them in the trash can,
because the well has been poisoned by as he called it,
(36:20):
main street media, as I call them, the spoon fed
regurgitators in the mainstream media. They keep talking down the economy,
as I've been talking about for months. They have been
trying to manufacture a recession, and of course because of that,
that has soured the opinions of people. And as Rick
Santelli said, take those opinion polls, take a big shovel
(36:41):
to them, and throw them in the garbage. Well, folks,
we're up against clock here. Stay tuned for Red Eye
Radio at the top the hour. I'm Kevin Gordon, America's
truck and Network seven hundred WLW
This is America's Truncking Network with Kevin Gordon.
Speaker 2 (00:14):
Welcome aboard, thanks for tuning in. Happy New Year, January first,
twenty twenty six. It's also the eighth day of Christmas.
I want to start off thanking all you truckers out
there on the highway tonight, not being at home with
your families, not being able to celebrate the coming.
Speaker 1 (00:35):
Of the new year, the New Year's Eve.
Speaker 2 (00:37):
Celebrations and so on, because you are busy out there
keeping the wheels of this economy rolling. Also first responders,
everybody that's on the clock.
Speaker 1 (00:48):
Thank you to the police and.
Speaker 2 (00:49):
Fire, hospital workers, people that are there taking care of patients,
food service employees all around the area, across the nation, Hotel,
motel workers, what people are traveling, You've got to be
taken care of. You've got to make sure that the
people in the hotels are there. Store clerks, convenience store employees.
(01:09):
As you're out there driving around and stopping by gas stations,
take the time to say thank you to.
Speaker 1 (01:16):
Those people, to those people that.
Speaker 2 (01:18):
Are working and thank that just say thank you for
being here. I mentioned this is the eighth to day
of Christmas. Again, if you've been listening to the program
of beginning. Well, I've talked about on Christmas Day, the
fact that there's a misconception that the twelve days of
Christmas are actually the twelve days before Christmas, that is,
(01:42):
actually the days before Christmas is what is referred to
well in Christian circles as the ads the advent period.
It is the fourth Sunday you go back for Sundays
before Christmas, and that is the gearing up and preparation
for Advent than the twelve days of Christmas.
Speaker 1 (02:01):
Then begin.
Speaker 2 (02:03):
December fifth or twenty fifth, rather Christmas Day, and then
go for twelve days until the twelfth night of January
the fifth, and then on January the sixth is the
celebration of the Epiphany, which is traditionally or through biblical accounts,
when the Majei the three Wise Men visited Jesus, Mary,
(02:27):
and Joseph. And so that has to do with the
actual Christmas season itself and is kind of a misconception.
And by the way, we've talked about this several times
over the last week, So if you missed any part
of that or missed any of our shows, make sure
you hit up that iHeartRadio app and everything's right there,
of course, brought to you by our friends at Rush
Truck Centers. Now, as far as New Year's is concerned,
(02:51):
the New Year Day itself, I love digging into some
of these traditions and kind of a lighthearted type of thing,
kind of light loosen things up or lighting things up.
Today looking at the traditions and how this formulation, I'm
always fascinated by how things develop, why things are the
way they are, how certain words came together, what their
(03:12):
meanings are, where they first appeared, and so on.
Speaker 1 (03:16):
This is something that just always fascinates me.
Speaker 2 (03:18):
Sivils civilizations around the world celebrating the start of each
new year, or at least have been doing this for
at least for millennia four thousand years.
Speaker 1 (03:29):
Today.
Speaker 2 (03:29):
Most New Year's celebrations begin, of course, last night to
some of the thirty first New Year's Eve and the
last day of the Georgian calendar, and continue for the
early hours of January the first, So people are still
out there having a great time reveling in the new
year while we're here talking to each other here on
(03:51):
the radio. Common traditions include attending parties, eating special New
Year's foods, making resolutions for the new year and watching
fire works displays. Now going back in history, the earliest
recorded festivities in honor of new Year's date back more
than four thousand years to the ancient Babylon. For the Babylonians,
(04:11):
the first moon following the vernal equinox the day in
late March and again in March, not January. In March,
when an equal amount of sunlight and darkness heralded the
start of a new year, they marked the occasion with
massive religious festival called a key to, derived from the
Samarian word for barley, which was cut in the spring
(04:34):
and involved the traditional ritual for last about eleven days. Again,
you know, festivities back then lasted for a long period
of time in order for to realign the Roman calendar
throughout the anti Let me skip getting ahead of myself here.
Throughout antiquity, civilization around the world developed increasingly sophisticated calendars,
(04:57):
typically pinning the first day of the year to the
agri culture or astronomical event.
Speaker 1 (05:02):
In Egypt, for instance, the year.
Speaker 2 (05:06):
Began with the annual flooding of the Nile, which coincided
with the rising of the stars serious the first.
Speaker 1 (05:13):
Day of the lunar new year.
Speaker 2 (05:14):
Meanwhile, occurred with the second new moon after the winter solstice.
So going back to even Egypt, they had a different
way of determining when the new year was after the
centuries the calendar.
Speaker 1 (05:27):
Let me see early. I'm sorry, let's go here.
Speaker 2 (05:29):
The early Roman calendar consisted of ten months and three
hundred and four days, with each new year beginning in
the vernal equinox. According to tradition, it was created by Romulus,
the founder of Rome, in the eighth century. Over the centuries,
calendars fell out of sync these old calendars with the sun.
Speaker 1 (05:52):
In sync with the sun, and in.
Speaker 2 (05:53):
Forty six BC, Julius Caesar decided to solve the problem.
By consulting with the most prominent astronomers and mathematicians of
his time, he introduced the Julian calendar, which closely resembles
the more modern Gregorian calendar that most countries around.
Speaker 1 (06:11):
The world use today.
Speaker 2 (06:13):
As part of his reform, Caesar instituted January first is
the first day of the year, and that is pretty
much caught on in terms of the celebrations. Tod of
the month's name Janus, the Roman god of beginnings, whose
two faces allow him to look back in the past
and forward to the future. Now New Year's traditions and
(06:33):
celebrations around the world previously mentioned going on for four
thousand years. Revelers enjoy snacks for good luck. In Spain
several other Spanish speaking countries, people bolt down a dozen grapes,
symbolizing their hopes of the months ahead right before midnight.
In many parts of the world, traditional New Year's dishes
(06:56):
feature legoomes, which are thought to resemble coins and herald
future financial success. Now I land to look this up,
excuse me. Legomes basically include lentils. In Italy, black eyed
peas and southern states. Also beans, peas, chickpeas, and soybeans
(07:20):
are considered these legomes, so they resemble coins and are
supposed to be doing with wealth.
Speaker 1 (07:26):
I found this fascinating.
Speaker 2 (07:28):
Because pigs represent progress and prosperity in some cultures. Pork
appears on the New Year's eve table in Cuba, Austria, Hungary,
Portugal and other countries. Now I thought that was kind
of weird in terms of pigs being symbol of progress,
But it goes back to if you look at chickens,
(07:49):
if you look at cows and horses, how they scratch
the earth. They are always doing it in a backwards
motion pigs because the way they root, they actually put
their snoot down and actually push forward to scratch the earth,
and so a symbol of progress going forward instead of backwards.
(08:10):
Of course, ring shaped cakes, pastries sign of the year, continuing.
Speaker 1 (08:14):
As far as what Mexico and elsewhere.
Speaker 2 (08:16):
In Sweden and Norway. Meanwhile, rice pudding with almond inside
is served. Whoever finds that almonds can expect twelve months
of good luck. Let's see what other things other customers
are coming around the world. Of course, watching fireworks, all
lang sign the all traditions that we do here in
the United States, and so a lot of traditions. And
(08:39):
I always, again, like I said, I always geek out
on these kind of things. I always find it fascinating
how traditions begin, how they evolve over the period of time,
why they started in the first place, and just you know,
how things happen and evolved. I just always find that
very interesting. Coming up, we're going to be speaking with
Phil Flynn. Of course, he is Price Futures Group.
Speaker 1 (09:02):
We quote him very often on this program.
Speaker 2 (09:05):
And he is the author of the Energy Report. He
is a frequent contributor to Fox Business News as well
as once in a while on the Fox Weather Channel.
So looking forward to talking with him, talking about some
of the things going on in the economy and kind
of gear up for what we can expect in the
(09:25):
new year. I'm Kevin Gordon, America's struck In Network seven
hundred WLW.
Speaker 1 (09:32):
I want to.
Speaker 2 (09:32):
Welcome back to the program Phil Flynn. He is the
senior analyst Price Futures Group, author of the Energy Report,
and a contributor to Fox Business News. And I've actually
seen him on the Fox Weather Channel. Phil, Welcome to
the program, or welcome back to the program.
Speaker 3 (09:48):
Hey kick, Hey, thank you Kevin. So this is day
five of Christmas. Do I get five golden rings for
being here?
Speaker 1 (09:56):
Yes? Absolutely, absolutely.
Speaker 2 (10:00):
Good.
Speaker 3 (10:00):
With the way the gold prices are going today, that's
going to be pretty good. But oh man, I've been
watching the sewer market for the last twenty Oh my gosh,
it's unlike anything I've ever seen before. I mean, we
hit a record high last night eighty four dollars. We
fallowed ten dollars and ounce, and even with that volatility,
(10:21):
we're still cheap compared to gold. So the precious metals
have been unbelievable.
Speaker 1 (10:26):
Absolutely. Well, by the way, how is your Christmas?
Speaker 3 (10:29):
It was wonderful. I must have got on the nice list.
Thanks for whatever you did.
Speaker 2 (10:34):
Well, it was because of all your fantastic reporting and
all of the stuff that you talk about in terms
of your energy report and the economy.
Speaker 1 (10:42):
I'll tell you what, this economy is on fire.
Speaker 2 (10:48):
And what I'm seeing is that the only in my opinion,
the only thing holding it back are these interest rates
that I think people are sitting on the sidelines and saying, gee,
do I make this investment? Do I do this so
I incur that amount of money with a return on
investment and so on. But I mean, you look at
I mean, every time we turn around, there's a report
(11:08):
that comes out, retail sales higher than expected, unemployment lower
than expect. We had that jobs report on well, I
guess it was Wednesday day early, the initial job is
claims less than expected. And yet we have this drum
beat from the spoon feder regurgitators in the mainstream media
that we're actually on the precipice of a recession, and
(11:31):
in my opinion, they're trying to manufacture a recession.
Speaker 4 (11:34):
You know, I think you're right.
Speaker 3 (11:35):
You know, a lot of times, you know, the mainstream press.
You know, it's amazing some of the people that they
have on the mainstream press really don't understand the economics.
And I think you see that more and more when
you see the type of questions you get. For example,
one of the things that bothered me is when the
mainstream press is saying, no, as soon as Donald Trump
(11:57):
puts on sanctions, we're going to go on through a
recession and an inflation is going to go through the roof.
And of course that hasn't happened, you know, if you
look at the historically inflationary Yeah.
Speaker 2 (12:10):
Yeah, well, and credit to you, and then credit to
my economics professor. Way back in the day when I
was at Xavier University. One of the things that was
talked about the tariffs were the main driving force of
income to the United States and it was only in
the period of after the war World War two that
tariffs on our goods going into the other countries kind
(12:32):
of a protectionism mechanism for them. But the tariffs necessarily
don't lead to inflation. And I think you was that
Kevin O'Leary, Larry Kudlow and a couple of people in
Fox business are some of the only people that I
have heard other than you know, you and me saying
that tariffs don't lead to inflation. It's out of control
government spending.
Speaker 4 (12:52):
It's absolutely correct. That's in fact, that's the only way
that cause inflation. And listen, when.
Speaker 3 (12:57):
There's tariffs to some prices go up. They absolutely do.
But I can give you for every price increase, I
can give you a price decrease as well. And we
saw that for example, you know, in the price of grains.
You know, the farmers don't like to hear that, obviously,
but that's the truth. And grain prices went down when
we had tariffs. So yeah, for every increase, there's a decrease.
(13:19):
And what we're finding right now is that it's actually
lowering inflation because when we take in more money to
the government, it reduces our deficit, and when we have
a smaller deficit, the government has to borrow less money.
We're already seeing that. And when we borrow less money,
we don't have to tax people as much to pay
for it, and we don't have to print as much
(13:39):
money to pay our bills.
Speaker 4 (13:41):
So you get into it, you're going to have to
that's amazing.
Speaker 2 (13:43):
You're going to have to talk slower because there's a
lot of my frontemies that listen to this program and
they're liberals, so they may not understand that real quick.
Speaker 1 (13:53):
So not just.
Speaker 2 (13:55):
You know, they don't understand as you said, they don't
understand economic and so the things that you just said,
you would think it would be common sense, but apparently not.
Speaker 3 (14:07):
Well, the news is, I think liberals are still sleepy,
most of them at the tower. I don't know for sure,
that could be a guest. No, No, I think you're right,
you know, and and it's it's hard to you know,
I you know, I think sometimes I think when you
hear you know, people on the other side when they
talk about uh economics, it's about emotional economics, It's like, okay,
(14:29):
well you know that, you know, they're you know, Elion
Musk is a billionaire.
Speaker 4 (14:33):
You know, everything's wrong with the economy.
Speaker 3 (14:35):
He or you know, it's like, okay, this guy, you know,
invented a rocket to go to Mars. You know, he
invented electric car industry, which wouldn't exist if if if
it wasn't for his genius, you know. And but then
of course they want to tell everybody to buy electric cars,
enforcing to buy cars. U listen, I mean the whole
thing when you look at the emotional side of economics.
(14:56):
I think we have to try to remove the politics
from thatomics, which is really hard to do because I
think a lot of these politicians on the other side,
you know, keep trying to tell us, hey, the economy's bad,
the economy's bad, you know when and it's all Trump's fault,
you know, when you know the previous administration, you know,
was there for four years and ran up, you know,
(15:17):
some of the biggest debt and inflation numbers in history.
So you know, yeah, they blamed COVID, but you know,
we know what really caused it, and that's out of
control spending.
Speaker 1 (15:26):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (15:26):
I mean, we had the Inflation Reduction Act that added
billions of actually trillions of dollars to the deficit. We
had the government subsidies that that latest round of well,
we had the what was it the what was it
the Green New Steel Bill that went through that it
was was it the Inflation Reduction Act or something else
(15:48):
that was supposed to be all this but it was
all this green technology that they wanted to fund and
a slush fund for them, which was out of control spending.
But when you look at what has gone on, I mean,
when Trump left office, inflation was at one point four percent,
the thirty year fixed rate was somewhere around two point
(16:08):
eight seven thereabouts, and people were making money, people wages
were higher, was out pacing inflation. And then the first
year of the Biden administration, boom. We're up to two
point five, two point six, up to nine point one
percent in June of twenty twenty two. Gasoline prices up
to five dollars a gallon, and all of a sudden,
(16:30):
the guys that broke the system, they're going to tell
us how to fix it.
Speaker 3 (16:35):
Yeah, it's pretty amazing, right, It pretty is, you know.
I mean, and when you think about, you know, some
of the things that President Trump said when it came
into office, one of them was energy. Right, We're going
to make gasoline prices cheap. And people say you can't
do that, you know, but President Trump did it. And
I think it's a combination of smart economic policy, smart
(16:56):
drill baby drill policy.
Speaker 4 (16:58):
But also politics.
Speaker 3 (17:01):
Right by neutralizing Iran, you know, by showing strength against Venezuela,
by you know, really getting control of the geopolitical picture.
You know, even the peace talks between Russia and Ukraine
wherever they go anywhere or not. All of this has
reduced the risk premium to oil. And I can't tell
(17:21):
you what leadership means when you talk to a barrel oil.
When the market's confident that we have a leader in
place that is not going to allow you know, major
oil price disruption. You know, a president that is not
going to sit back and allow Hooti rebels to start
taking over oil tankers. You know, that's a huge change
to the market and that shows up in the price.
(17:42):
And I think that's one of the unheralded successes when
it comes to these low oil prices.
Speaker 2 (17:48):
Yeah, that war premium that you were talking about, a
risk premium that has been one of the major considerations.
I mean, every time there was some sort of disruption,
the Huti rebels trying to choke off the straits and
form those seeking ships in the Red Sea and so on,
oil tankers and such and trying to choke trade. That
is a risk premium. And when you don't have that
(18:10):
risk premium, the free flow of trade. And we're not
talking about just well, we're talking about free trade, but
we're also talking about fair trade as opposed to these
talking about these tariffs. It kind of gives everything a
more level playing field. And I think what people.
Speaker 3 (18:25):
Are go ahead, Yeah, no, I'm gonna Figu're absolutely right now.
I think you know, when we get back to the
level of pay. Listen, I'm a free market guy.
Speaker 4 (18:34):
You know that, Kevin.
Speaker 3 (18:35):
I would love a world with no tariffs, right, you know,
and I would love a war with peace and love
and rock and roll and all that stuff, you know.
But you know, we've got to face reality. I mean,
in the real world, you know, every other country had
tariffs on us, and we were trying to be the
nice guy, right, and by being the nice guy, we
gave up so many jobs, so many factories, you know,
(18:57):
we lost so many industries overseas. Right, And so now
we're going back to a policy that stands up to
that in the real world. Right, when you stand up
to you know, countries like China that steal our intellectual
property or steal our businesses or steal you know that
kind of thing, and people say, oh my gosh, well
you know what's going to happen.
Speaker 4 (19:17):
You know, all the goods we're getting from China. People
are going to you know, we're going to you know,
they're going to cost so much more.
Speaker 3 (19:22):
And it's like there's so many goods from China that
we buy that the only reason we buy them is
because they're so darn cheap. And the reason why they're
so cheap, you know, they're using cheap labor, they're using
you know, cheap you know, materials, and if they try
to raise the prices on those things, nobody's going to
buy it. People are going to buy you know, name
brand goods as opposed to Chinese knockoffs.
Speaker 1 (19:43):
Yeah, exactly.
Speaker 2 (19:44):
I mean when you look at the average what is it,
the average salary in the United States factory workers, et cetera.
Is somewhere around thirty seven dollars per hour when you
add in the benefits and so on. And then you
go over to China, they have no benefits whatsoever, and
average hourly wages five to seven dollars. There's no vacation time,
(20:05):
there's none of the employee benefits. Of course, the wages
are going to be cheaper, and yet there's this big
gap between what they manufacture and then what they sell,
and of course that can be eaten into.
Speaker 1 (20:19):
By these as.
Speaker 2 (20:20):
I think you pointed out in your energy report that
the tariffs are absorbed by the manufacturer, the import or
the exporter, the importer, the wholesaler, and in some cases
the retailer. So there's all these levels where those tariffs
can be absorbed that it doesn't hit us at the
(20:40):
level at the consumer level. And we've seen that as
far as inflation is concerned.
Speaker 3 (20:45):
No, you're absolutely right. And listen, you're going to hear
from some buyers of Chinese goods saying, hey, we're going
to have to raise prices because of tariffs, right, I mean, yeah,
that's going to happen to a certain degree. But what
you're also going to see on the flip side of that,
other goods are going to go down in price, right
because they have to move goods, and you know, and
(21:05):
and then you're going to see alternatives become more competitive.
Speaker 4 (21:09):
Right.
Speaker 3 (21:09):
So you know, for example, I think everybody was outraged
because we were going to put a tariff on you know,
European pastas. Oh my gosh, we can't get we can't
get our pastas from you know, and it's like wait
a second, you know, it's how do you make pasta
like flour and water, you know, don't we have companies
in America because they can figure out how to do that.
(21:30):
You know, we really need it from Italy.
Speaker 4 (21:32):
I mean, yeah, it.
Speaker 3 (21:33):
Looks kind of nice and the boxes are pretty, but
I think we make as good as pasta in America.
Speaker 4 (21:38):
I say, buy America a positive.
Speaker 2 (21:40):
Yeah, and we didn't see a click break. Can you
hang with us through the break and we'll pick up
on the other side, all right? I guess is also
I should have mentioned that several times during this segment,
but I apologize for Phil Flint, Price Futures Group and
author of the Energy Report. I'm Kevin Gordon, America struck
In Network seven hundred w L, continuing our conversation with
(22:02):
Phil Flynn. He is senior market analyst Price Futures Group,
author of the Energy Report, and contributed to Fox Business Net. Phil,
thanks for hanging with us through the break. When we
were talking earlier about inflation and where we're seeing that,
I thought it was interesting and again, being a recovering accountant,
I just have to dig into the numbers and when
(22:23):
I see some of these reports come out, and it
was a few months ago or a couple months ago
when inflation ticked up. But when you got behind the numbers,
one of the largest increases was in the service sector
and was the fees being charged by brokers. And it's
a good thing, but a bad thing because the market
(22:45):
was so good, many people were coming into the market,
but then the fees on that were increasing because there
were so many more fees collected, not higher amounts, but
more people. And that was a factor for the inflation.
But nobody is really talking about. You know, when you
had ups contracts, the railroad contracts, the UAW contracts, who
(23:07):
else am I missing here?
Speaker 1 (23:09):
Up?
Speaker 2 (23:10):
Anyway, all these the east coast, West coast ports, they
got big boosts in terms of their wages. That's got
to affect our economy and that's got to be causing
a little bit of inflation.
Speaker 3 (23:24):
It is, there's no doubt about that. And you know,
when the economy grows, demand goes and that's it. And
we had what the incredible four point three growth number
in the US, which was blue away expectations right exactly,
and that you know, should put the naysayers to bed.
Speaker 1 (23:42):
But no, it won't, No, it won't.
Speaker 3 (23:46):
But yeah, I mean the economy is doing great in
so many cylinderies now.
Speaker 4 (23:50):
Listen.
Speaker 3 (23:50):
I know there's a lot of people listening today and say, well,
wait a second, Phil, don't you eat do you go
to the grocery store? I mean, those prices are still high,
and people are right, I mean, but there are some
prices in the grocery stores that are going to come down,
but there are some that are hot going to remain high,
not because of just inflation, just because of cycles.
Speaker 1 (24:14):
Right.
Speaker 3 (24:15):
For example, we had the smallest cattle crop we've had,
you know.
Speaker 4 (24:18):
In a hundred years, right.
Speaker 3 (24:20):
Because of drought and other issues. You know, so those
prices it's going to take longer to rebuild that herd,
you know. But if you look on the flip side
of that, grain prices are historically low, so you're going
to have you know, lower food costs there. You're seeing.
You remember, everybody was worried about aiding prices. Aid prices
are coming down, you know. So it's going to be
bumpy on the food side here for a little bit.
(24:43):
But we see the trend is going to be down.
Speaker 4 (24:45):
There's going to be.
Speaker 3 (24:45):
Certain certain commodities that aren't going.
Speaker 4 (24:48):
To get cheap soon.
Speaker 3 (24:49):
It's going to take a long time, but you're going
to start finding more value at the grocery store over
the next year, you know, except for a.
Speaker 2 (24:56):
Are starting to see it a little bit. I mean
where I live, of course, we experience or we luck out.
And the fact that we've got like five different grocery
store chains that are in the area, so they compete
hot and heavy with each other. And I noticed that
there are certain prices. If you look at their flyers
and their ads, there are certain prices. Every three weeks,
(25:17):
this price is down. Like coffee. Coffee I drink is
usually fourteen ninety nine a can, but when it's on sale,
it's nine to ninety nine, so you buy it. When
it's nine to ninety nine, you buy two cans if
you're gonna you know. So I you know the grocery prices.
I think there's ways around them. I mean I noticed
my wife was telling me the other day she was
in the store and they had milk on sale for
(25:38):
a dollar thirty nine for a half a half a gallon,
and the gallons were over three dollars and people were
coming in grabbing the gallons. They were coming in and
grabbing this instead of paying attention to prices. It's is
grab and go mentality, I think where people are getting
hurt on their grocery prices.
Speaker 3 (25:56):
But yeah, I listen, I think that's true. I think
that's true. I mean listen.
Speaker 2 (26:00):
I mean I only got about a minute.
Speaker 1 (26:02):
I gotta get going here.
Speaker 3 (26:03):
But well, I want my potato chip bags as big
as it used to be. Well, yeah, I think the
trends are getting better. There'll be a few things, you know,
like coffee. You know, they had a terrible drought, worst crop, coco,
same thing. But they're coming back, so we'll see what happens.
Speaker 1 (26:21):
Phil.
Speaker 2 (26:21):
Thank you so much for spending time with us again.
Aren't my guest, Phil Flynn, Senior market analysts, Price Futures Group.
If you don't get his energy report, you got to.
I mean a lot of information in there, and a
lot of good economic data.
Speaker 4 (26:34):
Thank you, Kevin. The Happy New Year to you. I'm
everybody listening.
Speaker 2 (26:37):
Phil again, Thank you so much for spending time with us.
I certainly appreciate it. I'm Kevin Gordon, America's struck In
Network seven hundred w LW is to Phil Flynn for
joining us. Always enjoy talking to him. I'd love to
have him on the program and talk about things because once,
as I mentioned before, he and I aren sync years ago.
Speaker 1 (26:59):
A couple of years ago.
Speaker 2 (27:00):
Actually I started reading some different articles and he was quoted,
and so I figured, I got to get a hold
of this guy and you know, get together and talk
to him and have him on the program and talk
about some of the things going on in the economy
and thereabouts. So again my appreciation of Phil for being
with us yesterday. We got ahead of the normal Thursday
(27:24):
jobless claims that came out.
Speaker 1 (27:26):
Early because of the New Year holiday.
Speaker 2 (27:29):
And it was interesting looking at the different headlines. And again,
as I mentioned several times before, when I see these
different headlines, it's interesting that how the headline sometimes doesn't
match the story, or the headline tries to downplay what
is actually going on.
Speaker 1 (27:49):
Just give you an example.
Speaker 2 (27:50):
According to Action four x US, initial jobless claims fall
to one ninety nine versus expected two fifteen. Not a
bad headline. Reuters US weekly job as claims fall to
one month low. That's kind of so so good headline.
I saw jobless claims declined for third straight weeks, a
(28:12):
sign of steady labor market. That is actually from MarketWatch
dot com seeking alpha. Initial jobless claims surprise with another
drop this week and another very good headline from Investing
dot Com. Initial jobs claims dip, beating forecast and previous figures.
Let's dig into some of the numbers here and interesting
(28:36):
how this is being covered, how they decide to cover this,
and some of the comments that they make throughout.
Speaker 1 (28:43):
So let's just dig into the numbers here.
Speaker 2 (28:45):
How about that initial jobs claim is the number of
people who apply for state unemployment fell by sixteen thousand
to a seasonally adjusted one hundred and ninety nine thousand
in the weekend in December, The twenty seventh Favorite Department
said on Wednesday. The report came out early due to
the New Year holiday. It is the third straight week
(29:08):
decline in new claims and the seventh week in the
past eighth. While claims were often volatile during the holiday period,
economists say the record low level of claims is a
sign of a relatively steady labor market conditions. So what
have we been hearing. We've been hearing from Lion Jerry
(29:28):
Powell and the Federal Reserve that the job market is weak.
We have been hearing claims in terms of what the unemployment.
Speaker 1 (29:37):
Rate is that we'll be talking about here shortly.
Speaker 2 (29:40):
All we hear about is the job market not being
as strong, but indications of what we're getting from initial
jobless claims, continuing jobless claims. It all points to something
that is not what people are being told by the
spoon fed regurgitators in the mainstream media.
Speaker 1 (30:01):
What's ahead for let me see, let's see here we go.
Speaker 2 (30:04):
Economists pulled by the Wall Street Journal had estimated new
claims would rise to two hundred and twenty thousand from
the initial estimate last week of two hundred and fourteen.
Speaker 1 (30:15):
They were off by ten percent.
Speaker 2 (30:18):
And when I say economists, let's not forget one of
the phrases that was done by lords J.
Speaker 1 (30:26):
Peter.
Speaker 2 (30:26):
He's a Peter principal where people rise to their level
of incompetence, a comment that was made years ago. And
economists is an expert who will know tomorrow why the
things he predicted yesterday didn't happen today. And so many
times we see these estimates and these expectations from economists
that never really pan out.
Speaker 1 (30:49):
Some of the key details.
Speaker 2 (30:50):
A number of people already collecting unemployment benefits known as
continuing claims fell by forty seven thousand to one point
eighty seven million in the week ending December twentieth. Continuing
claims have risen in recent years, and I want to
repeat years, because this is one of the first times I've.
Speaker 1 (31:11):
Heard them put this in an article.
Speaker 2 (31:13):
Because they keep talking about continuing jobless claims increasing over
this past year to indicate that the soft unemployment, of
the soft employment number and a weak jobs market to
claim to bolster their narrative.
Speaker 1 (31:31):
So where were these reports.
Speaker 2 (31:33):
In recent years about unemployment going or unemployment claims continuing
to go up? Apparently they didn't want us to know
that during the last few years or recent years, as
they say here in the article The.
Speaker 1 (31:50):
Big Picture, although relieves that.
Speaker 2 (31:53):
Claims are low, many economists again the word economists, worry
about the slow pace of hiring, especial especially since the summer.
The unemployment rate rose to four point six percent in November,
the highest rate since this September twenty twenty one. Now
I doubt that number, seriously, I am not buying that.
(32:15):
Nothing I see supports that when you have initial jobless
claims all being within that range of two hundred and
ten thousand, and again, this is below two hundred and
ten thousand this week, down to one hundred ninety nine thousand.
But things have been going in that range of between
two hundred and ten thousand and two hundred and fifty
thousand on a weekly basis for the last several years,
(32:40):
so that number hasn't been going up. Now that people
continuing to collect unemployment, it has risen, but there's also
more people coming into the job market on a regular basis.
So I'm not sure. I can't wait to see when
these numbers are revised, because again they're going to be
I think the date that that's supposed to come out is, Yeah,
(33:00):
the December number on the unemployment rate will be out
on January of the ninth. Now, on this other article
that I saw a number of Americans filing applications, jobless
benefits fell unexpectedly last week. Now, again this goes back
to things I've been saying. How many times have we
seen the word unexpectedly in twenty twenty five? In this case,
(33:23):
jobless benefits fell unexpectedly, retail sales, home sales up unexpectedly.
Every time we turn around, you pick up a story
having to do with the economy, and things are unexpectedly
in the good direction and unexpectedly low in the bad direction.
So again I wonder where these people are coming from.
(33:45):
Misial job as claims again stated that they come in
at one hundred and ninety nine thousand. They had forecasted
two hundred and twenty. Again they were off by ten percent.
Let's see. Though the economy remains resilient, with gross domestic
product increasing at its fastest pace in two years in
the third quarter, the labor market has almost stalled. Labor
(34:08):
demand and supply have been impacted by import terriffs and
immigration crackdown. According to Economous Again, economists, while off their
recent peak, continuing claims are higher than they were at
this time last year, and that elevated level aligned with
the survey from the Conference Board last week showing consumer
(34:29):
perceptions of the labor market deteriorated this month to levels
last scene in twenty twenty one. Rick sand Telly I
mentioned him a few times, Rick Santelly back during the
housing crisis, when the housing market bottom fell out back
in two thousand and eight.
Speaker 1 (34:49):
Two thousand and nine, he was on.
Speaker 2 (34:51):
The floor of the New York Stock Exchange and when
it came out that this subprime loans had gotten out
of control, and how they things happened, that this was
something that should never have happened in terms of the
housing price or housing bubble busting.
Speaker 1 (35:07):
And he was there and he was very frustrated.
Speaker 2 (35:09):
He said, you know what we need in this country
is another tea party. And that's what formulated people saying,
you know what, He's right, let's go ahead and start
these tea party organizations to where you know, all these
politicians that kept telling us that, hey, don't worry about this,
we got it handled. All these people, both sides of
the don't worry about things, you know, just elect us.
(35:30):
We'll fix things or we'll keep things going on and
everything's will be okay. Then out of the blue, we
get these these numbers the tank the housing market where
houses lost about forty some percent, and so people started
going to meetings and going to city commissioners and starting
being active in politics, asking questions and saying.
Speaker 1 (35:53):
You know, you told us you had our backs.
Speaker 3 (35:56):
Well.
Speaker 2 (35:56):
Rick Antelly the other day was talking about what's going
on as far as the economy is concerned, and he said,
I'm going to paraphrase here, he said, you can take
all these opinion polls and all these things on surveys
as far as consumer confidence and whatnot. And you can
take a big shovel and shove them in the trash can,
because the well has been poisoned by as he called it,
(36:20):
main street media, as I call them, the spoon fed
regurgitators in the mainstream media. They keep talking down the economy,
as I've been talking about for months. They have been
trying to manufacture a recession, and of course because of that,
that has soured the opinions of people. And as Rick
Santelli said, take those opinion polls, take a big shovel
(36:41):
to them, and throw them in the garbage. Well, folks,
we're up against clock here. Stay tuned for Red Eye
Radio at the top the hour. I'm Kevin Gordon, America's
truck and Network seven hundred WLW
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