Poll Results: Uncertainty Reigns

The poll has been closed for a week now and I have been meaning to talk about it for a while and now I shall finally do so.  There was a broad consensus that sometime in the range of Q4 2009 to Q2 2010 we will see the recession end - but also that the contraction will extend into 2011, suggesting that there is a lot of pessimism out there still.  Though I wonder if some have in their minds when the economy will recover, not start to recover as the poll was asking.

In a related topic Moody's Economy.com labeled Oregon as one of the states it expects to see turn around first.  I hope that they are right, but I am a bit skeptical: I am not sure that pent-up demand for technology is going to really filter down to Oregon that quickly unless there is strong demand from abroad as well, and that is a big question mark.    

But I hope they are right.  I answered Q4 2009 in the poll, by the way, and I still think we will see an end of the fall by then, but I also anticipate a slow recovery.

Economist's Notebook: The White Stag Sign Redux

Randy Leonard has suggested that the city condemn the "Made in Oregon" sign and take ownership of it to prevent the University of Oregon from changing the wording of the sign. I have blogged about the public goods nature of the sign before: there are good economic reasons for public control over the sign as it is something that affects all Portlanders.  Bravo to Commissioner Leonard for being a good public steward and boo to the U of O for being a bad citizen.  Their hubris is unbecoming and unhelpful.  

The O suggests that this is a strategic ploy to come to some sort of compromise.  I hope not, the sign should either be a public property or it should go away.