Much is being said in the media these days about what economic recovery will look like. I suspect that life is too complicated to find generalised answers to this question, and that we are better looking at more specific areas.
One measurement of economic output I was told about many years ago was the “crane count”.
Very simply, how many cranes can you see on the skyline of your city?
Each crane represents an army of workers delivering a building project. Each one represents confidence in investment. There is no such thing (unless I’m much mistaken) as an idle crane.
How many cranes can you count, and are there more, less or about the same as this time last year?