America's Economic Future – A Discussion By Ted Kavadas
On December 14, Doug Short posted to his blog a chart showing retail sales per capita, adjusted for inflation (CPI). The data is through November, as noted on the chart: (click on chart to enlarge image) Of course, this view of total retail sales, on a per-capita (factoring in population growth) basis – as well …
On Sunday, “60 Minutes” did a segment on state budget problems. Both video and a transcript are available. The segment is worth viewing, especially for those who lack familiarity with the issue. While I don’t agree with some of its comments, it provides a good overview of the situation and some of the complexities involved. …
The following chart is from the CalculatedRisk Blog of December 9, 2010. It depicts Total Household Net Worth as a Percent of GDP. The underlying data is from The Federal Reserve Flow of Funds 3Q 2010 report: (click on chart to enlarge image) As seen in the above-referenced CalculatedRisk blog post: “According to the Fed, …
In his “60 Minutes” interview of Sunday (which I commented upon in the last post), Ben Bernanke responded to a question (from Scott Pelley) regarding the wealth disparity: Pelley: The gap between rich and poor in this country has never been greater. In fact, we have the biggest income disparity gap of any industrialized country …
My thought on the matter is that the overall topic of inflation and its effects is a complex one. Adding to the complexity is the definition of inflation. Most people define inflation in terms of CPI, but there are many different ways of defining the concept. On this blog, to avoid confusion, I try to …
I am finding “The Billion Prices Project” to be valuable. From the homepage, “The Billion Prices Project is an academic initiative that collects prices from hundreds of online retailers around the world on a daily basis to conduct economic research.” Two of the most prominent benefits I see from the data include that data is …
In Friday’s post, I mentioned consumers’ migration to lower-priced stores. This continual consumer migration to lower-priced sources can be seen in a variety of statistics. One statistic that I find particularly interesting is contained in a Forbes story of September 3, 2010 titled “The Next Web Phenom.” At the end of the story it states …
I found two especially notable items in Walmart’s Q3 conference call transcript (pdf). I view Walmart’s results as particularly noteworthy given their retail prominence and focus on low prices. I previously commented upon their results in the May 20 post. First, from page 13, “Comp store sales for the 13-week period, which ended October 29, …
On Sunday, President Obama was interviewed on “60 Minutes.” Here are four excerpts from the transcript that I found especially noteworthy. I may comment upon them in the future as I find them, in various ways, to be (at least) somewhat provocative: – President Obama: “And so, you know, the playing field now is a …
The results of yesterday’s elections further solidify the trend of increasing political volatility. Survey results indicate that much of this volatility has been driven by widespread dissatisfaction concerning the economic situation. While this volatility has been recognized, many of its implications have lacked recognition. On January 25, 2010 I wrote a post titled “Political Volatility.” …