In the ancient world outside of Israel pagan priests
discerned the will of the gods through omens in the sky and on earth. Israelis didn’t need omens because they had
revelation straight from God in the Torah. Omens came from the movement of
planets and from the structure of kidneys in goats sacrificed to idols. Pagan
gods would never have considered humiliating themselves by speaking directly to
insignificant humans. The more omens a priest collected the more certain he
could be of the will of the gods.
Investors today don’t have a revelation about the future. We
have the Austrian business-cycle theory that tells us to expect a crash after
years of artificially stimulating the economy with near-zero short term
interest rates and massive buying of junk bonds by the Fed. But we can’t know
the exact date, or even the quarter, when the crash will come. So like ancient
pagans we have to rely on omens that suggest we are near the end of the
expansion. These omens are what mainstream economists consider good news about
the economy. Here are some gleaned from the kidneys of the Wall Street Journal.
