It's as good as it gets. You've got low inflation, minimal wage pressure, great productivity, booming growth and strong demand.

Anytime you get a report that shows growth and goes against inflation, as in the productivity report we saw today, the market's going to react well to that.

High oil prices may raise inflation but longer-term it's negative for growth and that's how the Fed sees it.

Bizarre is not a strong enough word. We've never seen productivity growth this strong headed into the fifth year of a business expansion.

What Katrina has done is shift the economic focus from inflation to growth.

Inflation is the wild card for 2006, with rising oil prices, an increase in commodity prices, slow productivity gains and rising interest rates.