Time Marches On

 A few days ago a CNN pollster (?) was appalled at the Democrats for letting people think and poll (per a new poll) that Trump was doing a good job with the economy.

But economies change, and polls are a snapshot of the past. Economies are constantly moving into the future:

Generally, Erin, furniture, footwear, toys, and clothing," said Seroka. "Seasonally, we've blown right past summer fashion. Now our eyes are set on back to school, and that product should be here on the docks right now. Then Halloween to follow. As you and I have talked about before, May, that we just closed out, is usually the time where orders go into factories in Asia for the all-important year-end holiday seasons. I'm not seeing that happen right now."

"So is it fair to say — I mean, where are we in this process, you know, when the the tariffs on China were 145 percent and then Trump cut them to 30 percent and, you know, things have been all over the map, but any kind of reprieve that some would have expected we're going to get, that we would have gotten from that, you're saying you haven't seen it?" said Burnett. "So are we at a point where we're not far away from there being shortages of certain things or prices going up sharply for what is here?"

"We're cutting it close," said Seroka. "And realistically, what we'll probably see are fewer selections on store shelves and online buying platforms and likely higher prices. And you're exactly right that with this flow of cargo now, we're coming up really close on some very key arrival dates that aren't happening. And as a leading indicator to the U.S. economy, we see this activity three months before the ground truth happens here on the shores. And it's slow."

That’s port of Los Angeles executive director Gene Seroka. Sadly, that future is liable to leave a mark.