READ THE FINE PRINT - AT 6:17 P.M. ET:  Most economic predictions are worth ignoring.  One economist who always gets attention, though, is Nouriel Roubini of NYU, who predicted the global financial crisis.  Now he is predicting the easing of the recession by year's end...but you have to read the fine print:

Roubini, chairman of Roubini Global Economics and a professor at NYU’s Stern School of Business, predicted on July 23 that the global economy will begin recovering near the end of 2009 before possibly dropping back into a recession by late 2010 or 2011 because of rising government debt, higher oil prices and a lack of job growth.

Ah, there's the fine print.  We can get out of this...temporarily.  But we may slip right back into recession after a brief period during which CNN pays homage to Obama and space is cleared on Mount Rushmore.

We have deep economic problems, and they won't be solved by a cash for clunkers program or a stock market rally.  People forget that there was a sustained rally between 1933 and 1937, in the heart of the great Depression, followed by another dive and continued unemployment.  It wasn't until World War II that we recovered economically.

August 3, 2009