Happy New Year ! 2011 should be a better year.

As 2010 comes to a close allow me to wish readers everywhere in the blogosphere(readers come from over thirty countries in North and South America, Europe, Africa and Asia) best wishes for a healthy, happy and more prosperous 2011. We end the year with unemployment still far too elevated in many countries, but positive growth, some signs of recovering markets, growing but cautious optimism and reviving  animal spirits and a North American stock market up substantially over what it was showing at the end of 2010. Since we are now entering the 17th month since recovery got underway in the summer of 2009, judging by previous recessions and the recoveries which followed them, this will be a critical year, particularly for employment growth. If things go well and the stimulus plan passed in Washington goes forward as planned we should see some definite slow but steady improvement on the employment front in the U.S. There is a lot of unspent cash still sitting on the sidelines in the coffers of business and in some households. Hopefully companies will start the hiring process and bring people in from the cold in the months ahead. The most recent Chicago purchasing managers' report and the latest weekly jobless claims numbers in the U.S. were positive signs of some improvement. This needs to continue to bring the unemployed numbers down.