Consulting Economist with expertise in real estate, residential and nonresidential construction, and macroeconomic issues https://xitter.cf/t.co/XLhsrVHUe4
Washington, DC
Joined January 2013
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Bernard Markstein retweeted
AIA CONSENSUS FORECAST REVISED DOWNWARD: Mid-year update to 9 industry forecasts sees construction momentum ebbing, except for data centers, of course. @AIANational @Moodys @DodgeData @FMICorporation @WellsFargo @BMarkstein, @ConstructConnx, @ABCNational. lnkd.in/gyUqiFjF
Bernard Markstein retweeted
@BMarkstein just read your 2026 ASID Economic Outlook. Good things in there for our industry. Passing it on to our people.
Bernard Markstein retweeted
So you're telling me that cutting tariffs leads to lower prices?
Fascinating.
Bernard Markstein retweeted
They should change the name to "Strait of Schrödinger". It's both open and closed at the same time.
Bernard Markstein retweeted
"On the positive side, a somewhat easier policy stance by the Federal Reserve has resulted in lower interest rates. Further declines in interest rates are likely in 2026."
go.abc.org/4al1P5C
#ABCMeritShopProud
Bernard Markstein retweeted
On inflation and the tariffs: "Foreign countries aren't giving us discounts. They're not eating the tariffs. Some of it's going through to the grocery store, but a lot of it's coming out of the profits of big corporations. That's not going to happen forever "
Bernard Markstein retweeted
Think of an economy as like baking a cake. H1-B visas exist so that if you're out of a specific ingredient, you can Instacart it and keep baking. Add a $100k delivery charge and you'll choose to:
1. Quit baking; or
2. Use an inferior recipe; or
3. Import cake instead of making it
Bernard Markstein retweeted
You can’t bend reality; you can shatter trust. Politicized stats fool no one—markets, the Fed, and CEOs will ignore propaganda—but they will all suffer without reliable data. Break the thermometer, and you still have a fever. And without reliable diagnostic tools, you won't get the right medicine.
Bernard Markstein retweeted
It's almost too perfect when the only "analyst" supporting EJ Antoni can't even read a pie chart correctly.
🚨 A new Rasmussen poll shows 2 out of 3 voters no longer trust government stats.
After a Census miscount admission and conflicting jobs data, who can blame them?
It’s time for the Senate to confirm @RealEJAntoni to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. We need honest numbers!
Bernard Markstein retweeted
Put a useful idiot in charge of economic statistics and we suddenly get a reason to suspend our most valuable and reliable measures, just as the economy is slowing. It's cooking the books by erasing inconvenient numbers. Indefensibly destructive, economically harmful, and markets will hate it.
👀 “E.J. Antoni, the economist tapped by President Donald Trump to lead the Bureau of Labor Statistics, suggested suspending the agency’s closely watched monthly jobs report, arguing that its underlying methodology, economic modeling and statistical assumptions are fundamentally flawed.”
“Until it is corrected, the BLS should suspend issuing the monthly job reports but keep publishing the more accurate, though less timely, quarterly data,” he said on Fox Business.
foxbusiness.com/politics/tru…
Bernard Markstein retweeted
Last time Trump put tariffs on steel, American steelmakers hired 1,000 more people.
That's great. But companies that MAKE things out of steel lost 75,000 jobs!
Tariffs hurt more than they help.
Economist @scottlincicome explains in my new video:
Bernard Markstein retweeted
Firing the BLS Commissioner — the wonk in charge of the statisticians who track economic reality — is an authoritarian four alarm fire.
It will also backfire: You can't bend economic reality, but you can break the trust of markets. And biased data yields worse policy.
Bernard Markstein retweeted
Folks who won't be fooled by politicized official economic statistics:
- The Fed
- The bond market
- The stock market
- Foreign investors
Folks who will be flying blind in the absence of reliable econ data:
- All of the above
- Small biz
- Big biz
- Voters
Bernard Markstein retweeted
The 2018 steel tariffs just called to remind you that steel is produced by a tiny sliver of the economy, but used as an input by a much broader swathe of manufacturers.
econofact.org/steel-tariffs-…
Bernard Markstein retweeted
One of the great joys of my life is that I educate students from all around the world. It may not look like it, but that makes me an exporter, bringing in money from abroad. But the President is making that harder, thereby blowing out the trade deficit.
Bernard Markstein retweeted
It's a rich irony that a President who is obsessed by the trade balance is blocking one of our best exports: American higher ed.
International students pay fees, create high-paying jobs, learn ideas, and spread them globally.
But they can't come without reliable visas.
Bernard Markstein retweeted
If you did not know about tariffs you would look at today’s labor data and think the economy was doing just fine.
4.2% unemployment rate
177k job gains
60.2% participation rate
34.2. Weekly hours worked
But a cliff is coming if we do not get some policy stability on trade.
Bernard Markstein retweeted
Let’s just put a bookmark in this.
As the data roll in, leading economic indicators will turn first. This means this will come in a little bit of April data and a lotta bit of May data.
