Interpreting Micro-Economic Conditions

The slowing economy in 2000 combined with Home Depot’s aggressive expansion efforts was the reason for Home Depot’s poor financial performance. Between June 1999 and May 2000, the FED had raised interest rates six times – or a total of 1.75 percentage points – in an effort to slow the economy and economists had been noticing some softening of overall consumer demand.

The lack of response to low mortgage rates shows that no one industry or market will be able to stimulate economic growth, other industries and markets must join in. The labor market has taken initiative and has made changes, such as adding jobs to the economy in order to lower the unemployment rate. When the United States economy first went into its recession in the years 2008 and 2009, 7.4 million jobs were lost. Since then, there have been over 7.2 million jobs created, which is a 97 percent recovery of “employed persons” in the economy; furthermore, unemployment is at a five year low, sitting at 6.7 percent (Green). These changes in the labor market are crucial for success. Increasing employment throughout the United States, will increase household incomes dramatically. With this increase in household income, comes confidence which will guide consumers to spend the money they make in the economy, instead of saving it. During recessions, there is a sudden increase in savings which stop the flow of money in the economy. However, now the saving rate, the amount of income not spent but set aside, has continued to drop. In December 2013, the saving rate was 3.9 percent, a large decrease from 4.3 percent in November of that same year. The average rate for the entire year was 4.5 percent, the lowest saving

The news mediums, television, radio, print, or social media give information 24-hours a day regarding the economy. Individuals are not so sure about the reports issued on almost an hourly basis that are stating the economy of United States is improving. Many Americans are still without jobs, and do not believe their income can continue to support their families. The cost of purchasing a home is going up in many areas across the country, which is good for the market, but can be bad for the first time homebuyer. Unemployment, expectations, consumer income, interest rates are economic factors that influence individuals behavior and the United States fiscal policy.

1). In 2016, the inflation rate was at 2.07 percent, and as of February 2017 the rate is about .90 percent (“Inflation Rate,” n.d.). As we can see, the economy has bounced back from its position during the recession. GDP has increased drastically since 2009, unemployment has decreased past its position from 2007, the interest rate has risen, and inflation has also gone up which indicates a strong and healthy economy. Although a higher interest rate is unfavorable for consumers and businesses, it means that the government is confident that the economy will continue to improve. This also means that consumers have enough disposable income to spend on whatever they wish, so the government does not need to lower the rate in order to encourage borrowing and spending. These metrics indicate that the economy has recovered from the Great Recession, and is continuing to improve.

How will Trump affect interest rates? Trump can improve the overall condition of the economy by guiding the

On the other hand, when the economy is not in good condition this usually means there is a smaller federal reserve and can also mean people are not spending as much. When people spend, they are contributing to the growth of the economy. When individuals suffer from having smaller funds coming in, this decreases the demand for new homes and these types of bigger purchases. When money and demand is lower, then rates often decrease.

Expansionary Activities: Like what I describe previously about the three monetary policy tools that the Fed can use to increase the money supply. Which are open market purchases of securities, discount rate decreases, and reserve requirement decreased? All else constant, whenever the Federal Reserve carried out the purchases of securities in the open market, reserve accounts of banks (and thus, the money base) increase. And whenever the discount rate is being lower by Fed, this results in a lowering of interest rates in the economy. Lastly, if reserve requirement decreased, all else constant, it results to an increase in reserves for all banks. Two out of these three cases (open market operations and reserve requirement changes), an increase

In 2010, the American economy was struggling to bounce back from a devastating collapse in 2007. The housing market had collapsed and economists were baffled. The stock market did not entirely crash, yet the economy still could not be stimulated. For the most part, much of the financial industry was left unregulated, allowing banks to loan money to people trying to buy houses, with no guarantee of the money being returned. With a low interest rate of 1.24 percent, people were looking towards the housing markets as an investment. The low interest rate sparked a demand for both mortgages and housing, expecting the prices of houses to rise. However, in 2004, the rates began to rise. By the end of 2004, the interest rate was 2.25 percent.

Hi Scott, I believe businesses will have higher profits if they have cash in hand to execute their projects, otherwise, their profits will be impacted as they will need to borrow money and pay a higher interest rate on their loans. Similar to individuals, I believe individuals who have saving will see their money compounded while borrows will feel a strain on any new fixed monthly payments. Additionally, I believe businesses have many factors when it comes to earning reports and interest rate alone will not impact their stated profits to shareholders. It will take time and perhaps several interest rate hikes to effect the current economy.

With the looming threat of an economic recession, action needs to be taken to try to minimize the potential damage. Subprime loans to finance mortgage-backed securities have brought instability to the real estate market. Banks have had to implement tighter lending standards to residential mortgages to try to offset this instability (“FBR-Beige Book – Summary,” 2007). Though several banks have reported tighter credit conditions on the commercial real estate market, credit availability and credit quality remained promising for most borrowers (“FBR-Beige Book – Summary,” 2007). Besides the turbulence in the real estate market, uncertainty in other financial markets have had a minimal effect on recent economic activity (“FBR-Beige Book – Summary,”

Microeconomics Essay The price of electricity has increased substantially in the last three years, as a result of that; there have been apparent changes in the demand for electricity for the consumers and it has affected the producers supply market. In the following essay, we are going to look at the effect of the increase in the price of electricity in South Africa, using the supply and demand framework. The reason for the increase of the price of electricity is to balance out the supply and demand of electricity. The National Energy Regulators of South Africa (NERSA) has approved a 25% increase of the price of electricity for 3years starting from 2010 (Roodt, 2012). Supply and demand are fundamental principles of economics, it is what

Personal history or microeconomic factors, and macroeconomic factors can be used to make projections about items in people’s budget makes it proper that they can help one to make better financial decisions.

Interest rates have a major economic impact on the real estate market. Interest rates directly affect property sales. Residential property realizes the greatest affect as interest rates have a considerable influence on a homebuyer’s capability to purchase a new property. The customer is affected when there are significant increases or decreases in interest rates. Declining interest rates lower the costs of obtaining a mortgage; this in turn creates higher demand for homes, and pushes home prices up. Conversely, high interest rates increase the costs to obtain a mortgage; these increases lower the demand for homes, which creates a decline in home prices. (Stammers, 2016)

The effects include an increase in the money supply, lower interest rates and a rise in overall aggregate demand (AboutNews, n,d,). This would boost growth as measured by Gross Domestic Product as well.

The collective way of all the decisions on demand and supply, use of resources and opportunity costs made by millions of people or firms sets the price for goods, services, assets and labour demand and supply therefore form the main principle that underlines all microeconomics (ESRC).