RJ and Makay

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The U.S. economy added only 18,000 jobs in June as sluggish job gains put a damper on the slow economic recovery for the second month in a row.  The number fell far short of 105,000 jobs that economists had predicted for the month.  The unemployment rate rose to 9.2% from 9.1% the previous month.

The economy is poised to expand at its fastest pace in eight years because of brisk consumer and business spending, according to a new survey of 51 economists by the Wall Street Journal.

The economists predict gross domestic product (GDP) will be 3.5% higher in the fourth quarter of 2011 than a year earlier, a slight increase from the 3.3% they projected last month and, if it comes to pass, the largest increase since 2003. GDP is expected to grow at a 3.6% annual rate in the current quarter, a 0.4% increase from the final quarter of 2010.

The most popular catchphrase for investors in 2011 could very well end up being "long on women."

That term, coined by Bank of America/Merrill Lynch economists Neil Dutta and Ethan Harris in a recent letter to clients, refers to an investment strategy in which you overweight stocks of companies catering mainly to women. Such a strategy is worth considering for several reasons, Dutta and Harris assert.