Exhibit A: Late 2015 Gas Prices
Still believe in economic forecasting?
Find me one analyst, less than 3 years ago, who got both or just one of the following right — and correctly forecast the economic effect of same:
One. Wholesale gas prices will collapse. Retail prices (what consumers pay at the pump) will plummet more than 50%, from close to $4/gallon to well under $2. The world will be so awash in gas that there’s serious talk of using idle super-tankers as floating storage containers.
Two. The foregoing will occur in spite of a war-torn Middle East wracked by no fewer than half a dozen conflicts, with failed states and shaky regimes everywhere.
Naturally, the same economists who characterized expensive gas in 2012 as a drag on the economy now cite cheap gas as an “economic headwind.”
Of course . . .