Your task is to extract the thesis of an opinionated news article by selecting some of its text segments. The thesis is a summarization of what the author wants to persuade the reader of. Your answer should consist of segments of the given text. Note that you are not allowed to combine different sentences.

US economy: Why I'm optimistic about growth in 2015. Could 2015 be the breakout year for the economy? Last week we got very joyful news :. All of this is good news as we ring in the new year . And the best may be yet to come . So why is the economy finally shifting into a higher gear? This isn' t a story of government-directed growth or stimulus spending . It's the opposite : Washington's role in the economy is starting to shrink after years of Obama administration activism . The private sector is starting to take over . The growth was propelled by a big rise in business investment, up nearly 9 percent; personal consumption, up 3.2 percent; and exports, up 4.5 percent . Government spending, which is a negative for the economy, grew by 4.4 percent, thanks to a big rise in military spending , but domestic spending is still restrained . The news was so good that even the threat that the Fed will now have an excuse to raise interest rates hasn't deterred the bulls on Wall Street . Here is the case for optimism going forward . First ,  a huge factor in the economic rebound has been the fall in energy costs . As the price of oil has fallen from $105 a barrel this summer to closer $70 by September,(and at the end of December it was at $53) the cost of oil imports has tumbled . Imports fell by nearly 2 percent , and this alone added almost 0.2 percentage points to GDP growth . Even that greatly understates the economic windfall from cheap energy . Production costs fall when energy costs do , so the supply of American-produced non-oil and gas products, such as manufactured goods, rises when gas is cheap . Gas prices should continue to fall , the good-news story rolls on , and the addition to GDP from energy should be even higher . Thank you, Texas and Oklahoma and North Dakota . And thank you, fracking . Second , businesses are clearly feeling less trepidation about investing , and some of the wet blanket of Obama's anti-business, anti-shareholder agenda has dissipated as the Republican Congress repels his worst ideas: cap-and-trade, minimum wage hikes, new taxes on the energy industry and massive new spending initiatives out of Washington . Gridlock now looks to be built into the political system for the next two years, and in many ways that's reassuring . Third ,  government spending has fallen a lot more than people think . Despite the boost in military spending in the last quarter, the biggest story of the U.S  economy over the last three years has been the retrenchment of government spending . Federal spending has fallen from 24.4 percent of GDP in 2009 and 23.4 percent of GDP in 2010 to 21 percent of GDP in 2014 . Even better news is that in the fourth quarter of 2014, federal spending as a share of GDP fell to below 20 percent, according to a new analysis by Dan Clifton of Strategas, an economic policy consulting firm . This is creating an anti-Keynesian boost to growth, because the government is taking fewer private sector resources each month . The 4 percentage points less of GDP that the government is spending means 4 percent more GDP for private businesses and families to spend . That's close to $700 billion a year more for private investment and construction and spending . This, by the way, shows the foolhardiness of the Keynesian notion of a government-spending free lunch . Five years ago the Obama economics team was talking about multiplier effects from higher federal outlays -- the stimulus bill spent $830 billion-- that would juice the economy with even more private spending . It never happened . Even President Obama's own economic analysis found the economy grew more slowly than it would have without the government debt- financed spending . The real effect of government spending is to crowd out private spending . A final reason for optimism is that the incoming class of Republican governors and conservative state legislators across the country should mean more growth policies coming out of state capitals . At least a dozen governors from Massachusetts to Illinois to Tennessee are talking about tax cuts to create jobs . So even if we don't get tax reform at the federal level , states should be providing an additional tax cut stimulus . Skeptics will say that Obama's executive actions on climate change, immigration, energy policy and so on will continue to be a restraint on growth . That's for sure . This recovery from recession is still nearly $2 trillion behind where we should would be if we had a Reagan-paced boom . This is still one of the most anemic recoveries , though it is belatedly picking up steam . It's also true that wages are still flat for most workers , so the big challenge for the economy is raising productivity so Americans get a well- deserved pay raise . As 2014 comes to a close, here's where we are : Interest rates are as low as they've been in 40 years ; inflation is tame, thanks to the surge in oil and gas output ; and corporate profits remain high . The rest of the world economy, from Germany to Japan to Russia, is a debacle . But that's all the more reason to bet on the USA in 2015 . And ,  no, Mr  President, you didn't build that .
Could 2015 be the breakout year for the economy?

The single reason why I celebrate Christmas. The December issue of the Journal of Family Psychology contains no fewer than five research papers documenting religion's positive impact on family relationships . Reading them reminds me of why I take my Christian faith seriously and the single reason I celebrate Christmas . What's that reason? It's not the wonderful lights, decorations, and music  - all of which surely do help brighten our spirits and the short days of winter . It's not watching kids' faces when they lay eyes on Santa or receive the toys they wanted . It's not even the seeming overall increase in generosity and loving-kindness in the public square at this time of year . All those aspects of Christmas are precious to me . But the reason I celebrate the holiday is this: Jesus's ministry not only changed the world 2,000 years ago, it's transforming lives to this very day . The essential Christian message of a loving, forgiving God is, at this very moment, healing broken people and families all over the world in ways that deserve to be called miraculous . I could detail many true accounts of such glorious makeovers , but I'll settle for telling you just one . It's the story of how I myself wouldn't exist if it weren't for the positive impact of Christianity on my family . It begins with my maternal grandmother, Michaela Batallan (pronounced bah-tah- YAN) , who defined "liberated woman" long before the political movement of the Sixties . We grandkids called her "Titi." Titi was born in 1896 into a well-to-do Catholic family in Ciego de Avila, Camaguey, Cuba . When she was a young woman, she and her sisters emigrated to the United States all by themselves . They ended up living in Southern California . High-spirited, Titi liked to party and, one day at a dance, she met a tall, handsome ladies' man named Guadalupe Armendariz . Born in Guadalajara, Mexico, he himself liked to drink and have fun . He didn't go to church . He didn't believe in God . When Titi was 28, she married Guadalupe , who by then owned a shoe repair shop in Saticoy, California . When they had children- starting with Betty (my mom), Carlos, and Yolanda - Titi gave up partying and began attending a Pentecostal church . It infuriated my grandfather , who demanded that she stop indulging in such religious mumbo-jumbo . She didn't obey . When Carlos was seven, he was stricken with polio and eventually couldn't walk . One day, out of desperation, Titi invited the minister and people from her church to come to the house and pray for healing . My grandfather was not happy ; he wanted my grandmother to take Carlos to the Children's Hospital in Los Angeles for treatment . But that day, he witnessed something he couldn't believe nor explain . After the praying was done, Carlos immediately stood straight up and from that day onward was no longer paralyzed . My grandfather, seeing it happen with his own eyes, fell to his knees . He was never the same man again . My grandfather stopped drinking and partying and began attending church . In 1932, the entire family - my grandpa included- were baptized . Not long afterwards, the family moved to Azusa, California , where my grandfather felt called to become a minister . With the help of his young sons - Titi and he ended up having eight children: four boys, four girls - he built a church with his own hands , using materials he collected from around the neighborhood . It's still standing . Years later, Grandpa Lupe's ministry was so successful his sermons were broadcast on the radio . By and by, he accepted an invitation from my paternal grandfather - Dr  Miguel Guillen, after whom I'm named- to join the Latin American Council of Christian Churches (LACCC) , of which Grandpa Guillen was president . Later, Titi stepped up and founded a sister organization - the Pro-Seminario - to raise funds for the LACCC's fledgling seminary . Just two weeks ago, in Galveston, Texas, I had the honor of preaching at the biennial convention of the LACCC . At ninety-one, it's the oldest, independent, Spanish-speaking Pentecostal organization in the country, with hundreds of churches in the United States, Mexico, and Central America . I and the many others who attended the convention also had the joy of celebrating the 60th anniversary of LACCC's seminary , which Grandma Titi helped to build . Clearly, I don't need the Journal of Family Psychology to tell me that religion has a significantly positive impact on family relationships . But in a day and age when religion is being bashed on a regular basis by pop culture , finding validation of my family's life-changing experience in a well-respected scientific publication makes for a--- well, nice Christmas gift . Yes, Jesus - Christianity - is able to dramatically improve lives . And not always just our own . When Grandma Titi had the courage and conviction to stand up to Grandpa Lupe and embrace the faith , she ended up catalyzing a miraculous change not just in her own life, but in the life of her entire family ... of the LACCC's seminary ... of my own life . If Grandma Titi hadn't invited those Elders to lay hands on my uncle Carlos . If Grandpa Lupe hadn't become a minister . If the Armendariz family hadn't joined the LACCC and met the Guillen family . Then my mother Betty wouldn't have met my father Mariano ...and I wouldn't be here to write this column . Ultimately, yes, Jesus is the reason I'm here . It's the reason I celebrate his birthday - the only reason Christmas means anything to me . For me and the two billion others on the planet whose lives have been remade , it's a time when we celebrate the incarnation of love, light, and life - the hope of a better day, a better life, a better world . Merry Christmas!
The December issue of the Journal of Family Psychology contains no fewer than five research papers documenting religion's positive impact on family relationships But the reason I celebrate the holiday is this: Jesus's ministry not only changed the world 2,000 years ago, it's transforming lives to this very day

Yes, too many of us are in pointless jobs - but don't despair. In his usual prescient fashion, Guy Debord once lamented that "young people everywhere have been allowed to choose between love and a garbage disposal unit . Everywhere they have chosen the garbage disposal unit." The Situationists' vision of the future was not, as I'm sure you've guessed, an optimistic one , but it's nice to see that their spirit is alive and well on the London underground . "How can one even begin to speak of dignity in labour when one secretly feels that one's job should not exist?" a poster asks , as part of a campaign called #bullshitjobs devised by the anarchist magazine Strike! Another poster reads:"The moral and spiritual damage that comes from the situation is profound . It is a scar on our collective soul . Virtually no one talks about it." And a third:"It's as if someone were out there making up pointless jobs for the sake of keeping us all working." Just what every commuter needs on their first day back at work, you might think . But I love these subvertisements, mainly because they are right . No one talks about the soul-crushing sadness experienced by the chronically exhausted and unfulfilled hordes . Forget the garbage disposal : we're in urgent need of an army of pooper-scooper-wielding refuseniks , because bullshit jobs are everywhere . Of course , complaining about any of this or doing something as daring as opting out finds you guilty of the most conspicuous of crimes against capitalism: laziness . Or a suspicious lack of ambition, resulting in the label of "scrounger" if you're working class and that of "pampered entitled millennial with no moral backbone" if you're middle class . But don't despair : humans have an incredible capacity for survival . There are ways to endure the pointlessly mundane jobs that many of us do . Here are my tips :. One of the most level-headed people I know sets very little store in his job when it comes to defining himself as a human being . Instead ,  it's the things he does outside of work that he regards as his main means of personal fulfilment . Guy Debord regarded maximum pleasure as the central aim of any revolution , so start your own personal one, via music or reading or sex or anything that you enjoy doing creatively . Then pour your soul into these activities instead of thinking about work . If you can do one of these activities during working hours , even better . Not people who use the word "facetime" as a way of describing hanging out, or talk about things "going forward" . These people will be first up against the wall . I mean family and friends, people you love . Love is the answer (actually, anaesthetising yourself with drink and drugs is the answer , but unfortunately it's less slimming) . This sounds flippant but can actually be an effective means of delaying job- induced madness . A friend who worked stacking shelves in Tesco overnight was able to keep his sanity by pretending he was playing a game of foodstuff-sized Tetris . In a similar vein, you could see how many Cradle of Filth lyrics you can subtly weave into your customer service emails, wreak subtle psychological havoc upon your colleagues, or, if you're a hairdresser , deliberately give everyone terrible haircuts for your own amusement (my hairdresser has been doing this for years) . The biggest modern lie is the one told by the Steve Jobses of this world : that, career-wise, we must do what we love in order to experience true happiness . It's a lovely thought but, unfortunately for the generation sold this nonsense by idealistic baby-boomers, a fulfilling job is a luxury, not a given . Instead , as some means of twisted compensation, we're offered slave wages, zero-hours contracts and made-up job titles . But as depressing as things look, it's important to keep hold of those youthful aspirations and harness them , if not for financial profit, then for sanity's sake . It's exhausting , I know, especially as in Britain we work the longest hours in Europe . You are right to be furious . We all are . In the words of the retro anarchist-punk soundbite dusted off by Russell Brand:"Let's have a revolution, yeah?" (At least after a short nap .) Let's continue to campaign for better and more flexible working hours, wages that people can actually survive on, and freedom from harassment and exploitation . Let's vote . Let's join our unions . Let's take the bastards to tribunal (whoops, no legal aid) . Because if you're going to do a bullshit job , you might as well get what you can out of it .

In a similar vein, you could see how many Cradle of Filth lyrics you can subtly weave into your customer service emails, wreak subtle psychological havoc upon your colleagues, or, if you're a hairdresser The biggest modern lie is the one told by the Steve Jobses of this world