Friday, August 7, 2015 -- Part III -- Katie Ledecky Takes First In 800-Meter Preliminaries

Katie Ledecky won the 800-meter freestyle preliminaries. One more race. Eight seconds slower than here own 800-meter record and she still took first place. Eight seconds off in a long sprint. LOL.

Katie Ledecky led the women’s 800-meter free in prelims posting a final time of 8:19.42 to claim the first-place seed coming back for finals. While she was 8.21 seconds off her world best of 8:11.21 for 2015 there is hardly a doubt that Ledecky will return to finals determined to hit the 8:11 mark.

The second place finisher came in almost two seconds later. More than enough time for Miss Ledecky to turn around, take off her goggles, look at her time, and then smile at the #2 approaching the wall.

Well off her best time, this is how The Washington Post headlined the story: Katie Ledecky takes it easy in 800 meter prelims at World Swimming championships.

For her penultimate swim of the FINA World Championships, Katie Ledecky, the 18-year-old Bethesda native and the sport’s resident phenomenon, delivered a performance that, in its own way, was as remarkable as any she has produced during this meet. In the preliminary heats of the women’s 800-meter freestyle Friday morning, she looked decidedly human. But don’t be fooled.

For any actual mortal – which is to say, any competitor besides herself – Ledecky’s time of 8:19.42 would have represented an unfathomably fast race. Only one other swimmer in the world had gone faster than that in the past 24 months.

But for Ledecky, who has spent the past five days at Kazan Arena rewriting the record book and leaving little doubt she is the top performer in the world right now, that time represented an off-day, a swim that did what she set out to do — win the qualifying heats and give her the top spot in Saturday night’s finals – but little else.

Read the whole story; it will water your eyes. Then go back and read about Hillary. It puts things in perspective.

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Railroad History

Disclaimer: this is not an investment site. Do not make any investment or financial decisions based on anything you read here or think you may have read here. 

The other day I posted a bit about the railroad history in the United States. There are parallels between what was happening to the nation's railroads in 1888 / 1889 is eerily similar to what is happening to the oil industry in the US today.

In 1888 / 1889, there was a glut of rail track and a glut of rolling stock. The government's tectonic changes in regulation changed everything. Everything was falling apart for the railroads.

In less than six months, the Santa Fe went from being the darling of the financial markets to a possible takeover target for financier Jay Gould, who owned the competing Missouri Pacific but had made so much money financing other railroads that there was a constant threat the he would destroy, or buy, anything in his path.

When the Santa Fe announced it needed to borrow millions to make ends meet, financial markets became wary.

Just after Christmas, in the year that was supposed to be the most triumphant and satisfying of his career, William Strong announced he might resign as president of the Santa Fe. While his health was blamed, everyone knew he was being pressured by board members who wanted a more fiscally conservative strategy, among them financier Oliver Peabody, whose Boston brokerage house, Kidder, Peabody, handled the Santa Fe's bonds.

Remember a few data points:

• the East Coast banks and hedge funds (in Boston, New York) still run the US, and maybe the world
• oil is the most traded commodity in the world
• market caps for every oil company has plummeted
• one can buy a share of some (historically) pretty good companies for less than a cup of Starbucks coffee
• the bloodbath is yet to come in the minds of many investors

A share in each of these companies costs less than a cup of Starbucks coffee:

• AXAS: $1.74
• Halcon: 97 cents
• SandRidge: 54 cents 

There are many, many more examples in which one can buy a share of equity in the oil and gas sector for less than the cost of a Big Mac meal, about $6.50.

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Jobs

I posted July's job numbers earlier (the unemployment rate remained unchanged at 5.3%). I mentioned that I consider any unemployment number less than 8% as full employment. I've discussed it before. Many of us were taught that full employment meant less than 4% unemployment but interestingly enough, policy wonks over the years, have suggested anything less than 6% is full employment, and seem even suggest higher numbers.

I define full employment as when everyone who needs to work is working. I'm not saying the jobs are good, or the pay is great, or folks are doing very well financially. All I'm saying is that the US economy is at full employment if everyone who wants a job has a job.

One needs to read the stories of what folks did to get work during the Depression to understand what I'm suggesting. Everywhere I go I see "Help Wanted" signs. The most recent example is the grocery store in our neighborhood: they've had "Help Wanted" signs for quite some time now. There are almost 2,000 job openings in Williston, North Dakota, according to some sources. and that despite the huge downturn in oil activity.

The safety net that FDR started has become wider and wider; it's pretty hard to miss the safety net if one falls. The unemployed millennials have cracked the code: live at home. Take Uber when you absolutely, positively have to be somewhere. Their most expensive line item: their smart phone data plan (and if they can swing it, they are on their mom or dad's family plan).

Despite the job openings, the number of folks participating in the labor force is said to be at a 38-year low, 62.6% (same as in June, 2015). The number of Americans not working is said to be 93,770,000 -- almost 100 million Americans.

I doubt 100 million Americans have no income from some kind of work. One wonders how much work is being done "off the books." I bet quite a bit. I learned a  lot about running a business "off the books" listening to stories of the wholesale food business (and, in some cases, the retail food business) while living in Boston for long periods of time.

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Milestones

Our one-year-old granddaughter took her first wobbly step last evening.