U.S. Industrial Production Collapse

When I wrote last month about Don Luskin's pathetic recession denial, I mentioned his argument that because industrial production at the time had been reported to rise 0.3% in March, there were no recession, an argument which was really misleading for reasons I mentioned then.

Now that argument appears more pathetic than ever. Not only has that increase been revised down to 0.2%, but industrial production for April was reported to fall by a full 0.7%. As industrial production fell with 0.7% in February too, this means that April industrial production is 1.2% lower than January industrial production, a decline of nearly 5% at an annual rate. The decline is even bigger if you look at manufacturing alone.

I wonder if Luskin will mention industrial production figures in his next column. Somehow I doubt it....