The only constant is change, and that didn’t change between the last forecast issue and this one. This past year, though, the economic changes that occurred left many of us with a sense of déjà vu. The key players haven’t changed; it’s just the significance of their impact on the U.S. and global economies that has.

Let’s start with Europe. Greece, Portugal and Ireland all had problems with their budgets last year. They still do. And in the past year, we added Italy and Spain to the list. To be blunt, if Greece, Portugal and Ireland had all required debt restructuring in the past year, the direct impact on the U.S. and global economies just wouldn’t have been that significant. Adding Italy and Spain to the list certainly increased the potential significance of the economic impact on the rest of the world, but the rest of the world kept assuming that the EU’s central bank would step in and provide liquidity as necessary.

That did eventually happen, but it happened too slowly for people in the financial sector and the world bourses. The bull market in equities slowed, but didn’t quite stall. Then the U.S. Congress started its “debate” regarding raising the debt ceiling. The world’s stock markets got a case of the jitters during the debate. Then, finally, the straw that could break the camel’s back showed up. Standard and Poor’s lowered the nation’s bond rating from AAA+ to AA+. The bottoms fell out of stock markets all over the world in response. Amazingly enough, a huge chunk of the money that was taken out of equities was put into U.S. bonds, the very ones that had just been downgraded by S&P.

In fact, despite the downgrading, day traders, governments, pension funds and all other entities that had just sold their stocks were actually willing to settle for negative interest rates on short-run (one- to three-month) maturity bonds in August. That’s right; they were willing to pay the U.S. government to hold their money for them, because the government whose bond’s that had just been downgraded was still viewed around the world as a safe haven. Or maybe, people realized the S&P that downgraded U.S. stocks in 2011 was the same Wall Street stalwart that had been assigning good credit ratings to banks that were engaged in buying and selling the collateralized debt obligations that led the way into the financial debacle of 2008.

So, as was the case last year, the financial sector is still in flux, stock markets remain volatile and the U.S. economy continues to grow at a slow rate. The latter, though, is generally ignored by the media. The fact that the U.S. economy continued to grow over the course of the past year while one financial sector disaster after another created headlines, and political foibles made things worse, should probably have been headline news, but that wasn’t the case.

In sum, the current macroeconomic picture is as follows. The unemployment rate remains high, and inflation is starting to become worrisome. In addition, income growth in the U.S. is stagnant. However, 90.9% of people counted as part of the U.S. labor force are employed. The number of home foreclosures is falling, and U.S. corporations earned record profits in 2010. Lastly, after two rounds of quantitative easing, the U.S. economy is awash with liquidity. Unfortunately, the banks are holding a lot of that money in their accounts at the Fed, and consumers are still more likely to save or pay down debt than they are to buy something.

Businesses, though, are spending. There are two reasons for this. The first has to do with the simple fact that, even when you don’t use your equipment all that much, age takes a toll on it. This is especially true for equipment that is used in the great outdoors, which includes a lot of the equipment used by the transportation, utility, construction and numerous other industries. The second reason is changes to §179 of the U.S. tax code. For the rest of 2011 (and I’m betting for 2012 as well) businesses will be allowed to deduct 100% of the value of their equipment purchases, and deduct that from their tax bills.

The only thing preventing businesses from increasing their capital expenditures even more is the slow growth of consumer spending. As noted above, incomes have been stagnant, and high gas prices haven’t helped. Businesses don’t increase supply unless they expect demand to increase. And until consumer demand starts increasing at a higher rate, the U.S. economy will continue to grow slowly.

How is all of this affecting the commercial truck industry? Well, in any cyclical expansion, the commercial truck industry grows faster than the U.S. economy. (The reverse is also true.) That was certainly the case in 2010 as the U.S. economy grew at a rate of 3% and the commercial truck industry grew at a rate of about 15% (according to NTEA’s Annual Manufacturers Shipments Survey). In 2011, the U.S. economy is likely to grow at a rate of about 2%. The commercial truck industry is expected to grow at a rate of about 25%.

According to NTEA’s monthly OEM/Body Manufacturers Statistics Program, sales of commercial truck chassis were up 28.6% through June. There was huge variation between market segments. For example, Class 2 sales were up 118.4% while Class 7 sales were up only 10.5%. Through June, all cab type segments of the market were well up over 2010, and every g.v.w.r. Class was up over 2010 with the exception of Class 3.

Throughout the industry, there are high expectations for the second half of 2011, and even higher expectations for 2012. This is the case for two important reasons. The first reason is that by the second half of 2012, state and local governments will likely be turning increasing tax revenues into higher expenditures on equipment. The second is that the construction industry should be doing better by then as well. In both cases, growth is likely to be slow, and won’t add a lot to total demand for trucks and truck equipment, but for the first time in years, they will be a net positive instead of a negative. And the rest of the application markets for trucks are expected to continue growing through 2012.

As we head into 2012, we should keep in mind the following: businesses will continue buying trucks because their fleets are aging and §179 changes will provide them with additional motivation to buy now. State and local governments should be able to afford trucks again and their fleets are aging as well. Lastly, consumer expenditures should increase giving a lift to the entire economy.

One last thing worth mentioning about 2012 is that it is a presidential election year. While it has become glaringly obvious that the two major parties are incapable of agreeing on just about anything, there is still one thing in this age of political rancor that all of our currently elected officials will agree on — they all think they should be re-elected. And since a poorly performing economy is likely to make that more difficult than would be the case otherwise, there is a high probability that the two parties will find some form of economic stimulus to agree on early in 2012.

While the media may be seeing another recession around the corner, it just isn’t likely. The Bloomberg economic forecast panel reacted to the latest news of debt troubles in Europe, the debt ceiling debate in the U.S., and ridiculous volatility in the stock markets by lowering the previous forecast for U.S. GDP for 2012 an average of .7 percentage points, revising it down from 3.3% to 2.6%, recognizing that it’s hard to have a recession when the expectation for business, consumer and government expenditures is that they will all be increasing.

Steve Latin-Kasper is the market data and research director of the National Truck Equipment Association based in Farmington Hills, MI. Latin-Kasper joined the NTEA in 1999, and provides research and analysis on markets and economic indicators as they relate to the work truck and trailer industry. He started his career at the Department of Commerce, Bureau of the Census, as an economic statistician. To gain experience in his academic field, he joined the Peace Corps in 1981, where he worked for the Republic of Marshall Islands government as an economic development adviser. Upon returning to the U.S., he joined the National Fluid Power Association as economist and statistical services manager. Latin-Kasper has taught economics at the Milwaukee Area Technical College since 1991. In addition, he is a member of the National Association for Business Economics where he has served as chair of the Corporate Planning Roundtable. In December, 2008, he was named one of Bloomberg’s top economic forecasters. Latin-Kasper earned a Master’s degree in economics from the University of Utah.