Changing Times

   GDP IS DOWN -- OR UP --  Consumers are spending more, but government is spending less and firms reduced their inventory investments, according to the latest estimate from the federal Bureau of Economic Analysis. As a result, U.S. Gross Domestic Product (GDP) growth rate slowed to 2.6 percent in the fourth quarter of 2013, down from 4.1 percent in the third quarter. An earlier survey put the fourth quarter growth rate at 2.4 percent.

   MORE MONEY? -- Personal income in February increased 0.3 percent, the government reported. So if consumers have more money, will they continue their spending trend that showed in fourth quarter GDP? And does this mean that recovery is well established, so the Federal Reserve can ease back more on its stimulus? Meanwhile, conservatives will use this data to support their demand that government spending be cut even further. The danger is that monetary and fiscal support will be pulled too soon, sending the country back into recession. It's happened before, most notably in 1937, just as the U.S. was recovering from the Great Depression.

   ILLINOIS BLUES -- The Federal Trade Commission said it's okay for the state legislature to repeal a law that bans auto sales and leases on Sunday. Illinois State Sen. James Oberweis asked for the opinion.  Who knows how many old Sunday blue laws are still on the books scattered around the country.

   TWO-SPEED ECONOMICS -- Europe has been trying to cope with wide variations in economic health among its various member nations, but that phenomenon showed up in America long ago. Compare the industrial Northeast with the agricultural South and Midwest in the 19th Century. More efficient energy technology and lower labor costs enabled many manufacturers to move from New England to the South in the early 20th Century. Later, the invention of air-conditioning brought many office buildings to the South. Combine all these factors and the two-speed variation closed somewhat.
   Over time, something similar could happen within the European Union, but that will depend largely on whether economic nationalism can yield to proposals for the greater good.

   ENERGY BOOM -- Oil and gas findings in the American Great Plains are fueling a population boom in that region, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. Six of the ten fastest-growing metro areas were within or near the Great Plains, the bureau said. These were Odessa, Midland and Austin, in Texas, as well as Fargo and Bismarck in North Dakota, and Casper, Wyoming. For the twelve months ended July 1, 2013, seven areas in or near the Great Plains, with populations of between 10,000 and 50,000 grew by 10 percent or more, the Census Bureau said. By comparison, larger metropolitan statistical areas, with populations of 1 million or more, grew by just 1 percent.