It's All About the Growth of Big Governmant

The money supply (M2) hasn't contracted at all during the Great Recession. The money is going somewhere. That somewhere is Washington D.C. Through taxes, deficit spending and money printing, the money inflow is creating a boom for bureaucrats. How can I be sure?

Washington D.C. office rents are now higher than the rents in NYC. WaPo reports:

While the commercial office market is in a slump across most of the country, owners of District buildings are finding this year they can command higher rents from tenants.

Asking rents at two dozen buildings rose sharply from the third quarter of last year to this year, according to CoStar Group, a real estate data firm.

Several, including America Square in Northwest Washington, the Victor Building on 9th Street NW and the CNN Building near Union Station, experienced double-digit increases, CoStar said.

The rise has been so dramatic that for the first time in five years, the average asking rent in D.C. is higher than in New York City, according to CoStar and a new report of third-quarter activity by commercial real estate firm Cassidy Turley.

Metropolitan Washington is benefiting from the expanding federal government, whose demand for more space in commercial buildings is helping to boost prices.

And jobs are plentiful in D.C. WaTi reports:

Throughout the recession, one major city stood out as an oasis for jobs and growth: Washington, D.C.

Supported by a gusher of federal borrowing and spending, the District of Columbia was the nation's only metropolitan area that never stopped growing. It stood as a beacon for the nation's millions of job hunters, from recent college graduates seeking careers in civil service to well-heeled lawyers cashing in on a bonanza of work stemming from health care and financial reform.

 Being the center of government, Washington is used to being insulated from national economic trends. But the disconnect became particularly pronounced during the Great Recession — thanks to the federal government's own expansionary response...

"We are one of the lucky ones," said Alice Rivlin, a former Federal Reserve governor and director of Greater Washington research at the Brookings Institution. The only other cities that fared as well during the recession, she said, generally were centers of military activity or smaller state capitals, such as Austin, Texas — which also benefited from government spending.