Two miserable years

Michael Dueker on Econbrowser:

Recession is projected to end in July or August 2009; jobless recovery will ensue until March 2010…

The second figure shows that the forecast is for a jobless recovery to follow the NBER recession again, with payroll employment declining until March 2010 and not returning to trend growth until July 2010.

Unemployment north of 10%? Yikes.

UAW response to Senate irresponsibility

Ron Gettlefinger’s press conference is here

Yes, the Republicans are lying sacks of manure.

Gettlefinger has a memo that was circulated among the Republicans saying Republicans should “take their first shot against organized labor.” It’s in the third segment.

John Cole Speaks

You listen.

The Saudi Arabia under Detroit

Alvin Powell, Harvard Gazette:

As U.S. automakers plead for a government bailout, the next great automotive revolution is already under way, as Japanese automakers plan for a generation of lightweight cars that vastly increase mileage and whose advanced materials pay for themselves through dramatically streamlined assembly and smaller engines, an energy expert said Wednesday (Dec. 3).

Despite the global financial meltdown and looming environmental crisis, Amory Lovins, founder and chief scientist of the Rocky Mountain Institute, was upbeat as he delivered the third talk in the Harvard University Center for the Environment’s Future of Energy lecture series.

…

In the automotive industry alone, Lovins characterized the gas saved from potential mileage improvements through better design and use of advanced materials as the equivalent of finding “a new Saudi Arabia under Detroit.”

Lovins, whose Rocky Mountain Institute designed and built a carbon fiber “Hypercar” — an SUV that gets 100 miles per gallon — said that today’s cars are massively inefficient. Roughly three-quarters of the energy generated by the engine is simply wasted. Of the remaining amount, most goes to move the vehicle itself. Just less than 1 percent of the energy generated goes to the vehicle’s main mission: moving the driver from point A to point B.

…

Though carbon fiber is many times more expensive than steel, Lovins said, it becomes realistic as a building material when the manufacturing advantages are taken into account. Because carbon fiber can be molded into complex shapes, it would allow cars to be made from far fewer parts — just 14 for the Rocky Mountain Institute’s concept car. Color can be added directly to the material as it is being molded, eliminating the need for paint shops entirely. Car body parts can be lifted with one hand and carried by employees, eliminating the need for a whole suite of hoists and cranes and other machines. Assembly can be simplified by molding the parts so they snap together and are glued, rather than welded.

…

Lovins said there are already signs that a shift to carbon fiber cars is under way, with one company announcing plans to build a plant to mass-produce carbon fiber autobody panels for Toyota and Nissan, indicating that “the next Japanese leapfrog already is under way.”

This country pioneered carbon fiber. It would be a crime if the main beneficiaries were Japanese auto companies.

Friday Cat Blogging

“You think this is your chair?”

My Favorite China In The World

Is made by the Homer Laughlin China Company:

Union-made, and it makes the food you serve on it look really yummy. I recommend it!