In the Wake of Trump's Election, Consumer Confidence Soars

The effects of a profound change in national direction are already being felt in the American economy:

Consumer confidence climbed in December to the highest level since August 2001 as Americans were more upbeat about the outlook than at any time in the last 13 years, according to a report Tuesday from the New York-based Conference Board.

• Confidence index increased to 113.7 (forecast was 109) from a revised 109.4 in November
• Measure of consumer expectations for the next six months rose to 105.5, the highest since December 2003, from 94.4

American households are expecting a Donald Trump administration to deliver. They are more upbeat about the prospects for the economy, labor market and their incomes, according to the Conference Board’s report. The results corroborate surveys by the University of Michigan and the National Federation of Independent Business, which showed jumps in household and business sentiment on Trump’s pledges to boost jobs, cut taxes and ease regulations.

How about that? This, of course, will come as a shock to the professional Left, which can’t comprehend the intangibles that make up societal trends; instead, all they can think about are their precious metrics, charts, graphs and “underlying causes.” But that’s why they missed the Trump phenomenon in the first place.

“The post-election surge in optimism for the economy, jobs and income prospects, as well as for stock prices which reached a 13-year high, was most pronounced among older consumers,” Lynn Franco, director of economic indicators at the Conference Board, said in a statement. “Looking ahead to 2017, consumers’ continued optimism will depend on whether or not their expectations are realized.”

Unsurprising that older Americans are reacting so positively — unlike the younger, still shell-shocked Democrats and Vichyconkidz, they actually remember a time when the economy worked. Meanwhile:

Japanese electronics company Panasonic and U.S. electric car maker Tesla said Tuesday they plan to begin production of solar cells at a factory in Buffalo, New York. The two companies said they finalized an agreement calling for Tokyo-based Panasonic to pay capital costs for the manufacturing. Palo Alto, California-based Tesla made a “long-term purchase commitment” to Panasonic.

Their statement gave no financial figures.

The factory in Buffalo is under development by SolarCity Corp., a San Mateo, California-based solar panel company owned by Tesla. The photovoltaic cells and modules will be used in solar panels for non-solar roof products and solar glass tile roofs that Tesla plans to begin making, the announcement said.

Production is due to begin in mid-2017. Tesla said it will create 1,400 jobs in Buffalo, 500 in manufacturing and plans further expansion in Buffalo.

And finally, in a not-unrelated development, America’s most noxious union is already cutting back, in anticipation of its irrelevance to come:

In a clear sign that labor unions are bracing for lean times under Donald Trump, the massive Service Employees International Union is planning for a 30 percent budget cut over the next year, according to an internal memo reviewed by Bloomberg Businessweek.

“Because the far right will control all three branches of the federal government, we will face serious threats to the ability of working people to join together in unions,” SEIU President Mary Kay Henry wrote in an internal memo dated Dec. 14.

“These threats require us to make tough decisions that allow us to resist these attacks and to fight forward despite dramatically reduced resources.” After citing the need to “dramatically re-think” how to implement the union’s strategy, Henry’s all-staff letter announces that SEIU “must plan for a 30% reduction” in the international union’s budget by Jan. 1, 2018, including a 10 percent cut effective at the start of 2017.

A 30% reduction is a good start, but the country won’t be safe from these government-funded thugs until we reach 100%, and public-employee unions are once again banned, as they were until the Kennedy administration. Enough is enough.