Way back when I went to college (no, the dinosaurs were not roaming the earth then), a standard BS (that’s a Bachelor of Science, folks) in chemical engineering demanded the completion of 144 credits. Given that this is a technical program- and three hours labs only yielded 1 credit- plus there were  14 lab courses to be completed), it meant some 2580 hours of instruction. Part of that curriculum included two courses in aeronautical engineering.

That’s where I first learned the term “escape velocity”. That’s the required speed for an object to break free of the earth’s gravitational forces. (In case you want to know it’s 11.2 km/s or about 20,000 mph.) OK, you say, enough tech for today.

And, you’re right. I’m just leading up to the fact that we also need to have sufficient economic growth to escape the “gravity” of a recession. So, there is an ‘escape velocity’ for our economy. But, unlike the formula you see above, we have no prima facie determination of what might be the necessary momentum for our (or any economy) to be in such a state.

It could be our current manufacturing levels. As you can see from the graph below, our manufacturing production is finally leaving the basement level. And, that could be the signal that we’ve reached escape velocity.

Of course, given the fact that Europe is still practicing austerity (and the distinct possibility that the impending Congress may also adopt this bad idea, because they believe all government is bad [why is it again that they run for office in government????]), there may be the equivalent of the Challenger disaster- where our economy implodes yet again.

Right now, the European nations ($13 trillion GDP, about 2 trillion less than that of the US, and about 17% of the total world economy) are in a cycle of high unemployment, low consumer and business demand, poor investment, and virtually no inflation. And, that situation has obtained for some seven years now. That is certainly nowhere near an escape velocity for that portion of the world.

You see, the other part of the economic problem is that the US is no longer the prime driver of the world’s economy. A decade ago, the US was responsible for 1/3 of the world’s economy. Now, our contribution is some 22%. Furthermore, we no longer are a big importer (oh, we’re big, just not BIG)- dropping from 1/6 the world’s imports to about 1/8- and dropping more as we find the price of oil tanking- and our oil and gas production mushrooming.

So, I ask again- is it safe yet?  Not if we decide to emulate the (clearly useless) policies obtaining in Europe.

(Oh, and by the way, the European Central Bank is strongly considering the Quantitative Easing policy that our Federal Reserve is just now abandoning.  Even though it worked for us, it was maligned by many.)

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