Patrick Fearon Economy Quotations

The positive message is that if you strip out the numbers that the Labor Department says are the result of the hurricane, the underlying figures are still pretty decent. That shows that there was some cushion in the economy before Katrina hit.

The service sector of the economy is still growing at a good pace and that is consistent with what we were seeing in the employment report for November.

Companies are reaping the benefit of enhancements in technology discovery, which has helped them increase their productivity. At the same time, there is a level of competition in the economy that is quite a bit stronger than it has been in the past.

There was decent strength across the retail sector. These numbers are consistent with an economy growing at a comfortable rate, a pace that would allow the Fed to continue to raise interest rates in a measured fashion.

It remains pretty clear that corporations are interested in holding on to their workers as the economy continues to expand.

The ISM index shows that the service side of the economy continues to grow well and that's important because that sector makes up the large majority of the economy.