Public-data dashboard

The economy, with sources and dates.

A handful of the indicators I watch, each on real public data from the Federal Reserve, back to 1976, with recessions shaded. This is a static-site port of the R and Quarto econ dashboards I maintain.

Dated FRED snapshots. Each chart is regenerated from FRED whenever I run the data script, and the as-of month is printed on every card, so you can see exactly how current it is.
Recessions shaded. The gray bands are NBER-dated US recessions, the context these indicators are usually read against.
Hover to read any month. A crosshair tracks your pointer and the reading updates live. No backend and no charting library: the data is a static JSON drawn with a hand-rolled, dependency-free SVG chart.

Yield curve, 10-year minus 2-year

0.46 pp

Aug 2026

The 10-year minus 2-year Treasury spread. Below the dashed zero line the curve is inverted, which has preceded every recession since the 1970s.

Source: FRED (Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis): GS10, GS2. Recession dating: NBER.

Unemployment rate

4.1%

Aug 2026

The share of the labor force actively looking for work. It bottoms late in an expansion and spikes through every recession (shaded).

Source: FRED (Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis): UNRATE. Recession dating: NBER.

Inflation, CPI year over year

3.3%

Jul 2026

Headline CPI versus the same month a year earlier. The dashed line is the Federal Reserve's stated 2 percent longer-run objective.

Source: FRED (Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis): CPIAUCSL. Recession dating: NBER.

Federal funds rate

3.63%

Aug 2026

The Federal Reserve's policy rate, monthly average. It is raised to cool the economy and cut, often sharply, into and through recessions.

Source: FRED (Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis): FEDFUNDS. Recession dating: NBER.

Housing starts

1239k

Jul 2026

New privately owned housing units started, in thousands at a seasonally adjusted annual rate. Residential construction is one of the most rate-sensitive parts of the economy and rolls over early in most cycles.

Source: FRED (Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis): HOUST. Recession dating: NBER.

Construction spending, year over year

-3.79%

Jul 2026

Total construction spending versus the same month a year earlier, residential and nonresidential combined. It is the demand backdrop for anyone selling into the trades. The series begins in 1993.

Source: FRED (Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis): TTLCONS. Recession dating: NBER.

Want to poke at one? The yield curve has an interactive version with a time-range toggle, and there is a short write-up on how to read it. Data: FRED (Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis); recession dating: NBER.

Want to talk data pipelines?

This is the analytics side of what I do: public data, pulled and transformed on a schedule, rendered so it cannot quietly go stale. Happy to get into the pipeline or the charts.

Get in touch

The economy, with sources and dates.

Dated FRED snapshots. Each chart is regenerated from FRED whenever I run the data script, and the as-of month is printed on every card, so you can see exactly how current it is.

Recessions shaded. The gray bands are NBER-dated US recessions, the context these indicators are usually read against.

Hover to read any month. A crosshair tracks your pointer and the reading updates live. No backend and no charting library: the data is a static JSON drawn with a hand-rolled, dependency-free SVG chart.