Thursday, March 21, 2024

The 18.6 Year Cycle in the General Economy | Louis M. Thompson

I believe there are weather cycles that trigger events in our economy, and I believe there is one weather cycle that is related to the 18.6 year lunar cycle. For that reason, I have prepared a lunar declination chart patterned after Fig. 1 and shown as Fig. 3. If a relationship between the lunar cycle and the weather cycle can be explained, we will gain a real milestone in explaining the business cycle.
 
 
 

[...] We have a 9.3-year cycle in production, which gives rise to a 9.3-year cycle in grain prices. Highest yields have occurred at the time of minimum declination and the four following years. Lowest prices have occurred because of a build-up of supplies, and the low prices have occurred about every 9.3 years and every 18.6 years. Fig. 3 describes the cycle in agriculture better than it does the general economy. Yet, as we look back to the nineteenth century, there were depressions at the time of maximum declination (285°) in every 18.6-year cycle. In this century, our lowest agricultural prices occurred in 1913, 1932, 1950, 1969, and 1987, or every 18.6 years. lt appears that a weather cycle of 18.6 years drives a production cycle of the same length, which drives a price cycle of the same length.

Quoted from:
Louis M. Thompson (1989) - The 18.6-Year Cycle in the General Economy.
In: Cycles, May/June 1989, Foundation for the Study of Cycles.
 
See also:
In: Cycles: The Science of Prediction.