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consumer spending
Revolts From Wisconsin to Libya Pose Economic Threats
By Joseph Schuman - AOL NewsAmericans are more confident about the state of the economy than at any point in the past three years. But the world may soon burst their bubble. The Conference Board said today that its consumer confidence index for February leaped to 70.4 from a level of 64.8 for the previous month. Though still a bit weak by historic standards -- a level of 100 represents confidence levels of 1985 -- that's the most optimistic reading since February 2008. And economists cheered the index as a sign that consumer spending, by far the biggest driver of U.S. economic growth, will grow more robust in the ...
RockTenn Buys Smurfit-Stone: 3 Good Things About the $3.5 Billion Deal
By Mary Phillips-Sandy - AOL NewsAll of a sudden, people are excited about cardboard boxes. On Sunday, paper and packaging company RockTenn Co. said it would acquire rival Smurfit-Stone for $3.5 billion in cash and stock, a deal that will create the second-largest container-board company in North America. Its combined annual sales will total $9 billion after the acquisition closes in the second quarter of this year. The companies have not released specific information about the impact on employees and operations, and although corporate takeovers often involve bad news for some workers, today there's a lot of positive ...
Weekend Snowstorm Caused Consumer Spending to Fall by Almost Half in the East
By Bruce Drake - Politics DailyMost New Yorkers and others in the East have probably been most focused on the woes caused by their snowbound streets. But, a big side effect of the blizzard that struck parts of the Midwest on Christmas Eve and then barreled into the East was a huge drop in average consumer spending, according to a Gallup poll conducted Dec. 26-27. Average daily spending by consumers for the two days after Christmas -- when many shoppers make a second run at the stores -- dropped in the East from $89 during the period of Dec. 19-22 to $48, a decline of 46 percent. The impact of bad weather in the Midwest ...
Robert Reich's Advice to Obama: Pick Fights, Connect Dots on the Economy
By Jill Lawrence - Politics DailyRobert Reich has watched one president after another lose his voice once he's in Washington, surrounded by aides with what Reich calls "an instinct for the capillary" and little feel for the simple overarching narrative that makes perfectly clear what you are trying to accomplish. Don't get him wrong. The Berkeley public policy professor, a veteran of the Ford, Carter and Clinton administrations, said in an interview that Barack Obama is "a wonderful president" with "a superb temperament" for whom he has "enormous respect." There was a slight pause before he continued. "I would rather he be ...
Contra Washington Post, Americans Likely to Save More, Not Less
By Paul Wachter - AOL News(Aug. 31) -- Robert Samuelson, The Washington Post's economics and politics columnist, surveys the country's lingering economic malaise and points his finger at consumers. He wrote Monday: Why is the recovery faltering? There are many explanations: a depressed housing market; weaker-than-expected exports; cautious corporations. But consumers, representing 70 percent of the economy's $14.5 trillion of spending, are the crux of the matter. Americans are saving too much, he argues. The personal savings rate is 6 percent today, compared with 2 percent in 2007. He cites, approvingly, a couple of ...
10 Big Retailers Shuttering Stores
By not in system - AOL News(Aug. 20) -- Your next shopping trip may not be as convenient as it used to be. The second quarter earnings season brought news from several major retailers that they will be shutting down stores. Both Saks (SKS) and Abercrombie & Fitch (ANF) said they were closing stores in several parts of the country. Meanwhile, other stores like the struggling Blockbuster video rental chain, continue to slash stores by the dozens. American Apparel (APP), which is close to defaulting on its loans, just may be next. .brddelete { background:#F6F6F6 none repeat scroll 0 0; color:#DDDDDD; padding:5px; ...
The 'New Normal' in Consumer Spending? Right Now, It's $67 a Day
By Bruce Drake - Politics DailyReflecting the post-meltdown "new normal" in consumer spending, Americans parted with about $67 per day in stores, restaurants, gas stations and online in June, down $5 a day from the previous month and up $6 a day from June 2009 -- but well below the $81 to $114 range of daily spending in 2008, according to Gallup. Gallup considers $59 to $67 a day the "new normal" in the wake of the economic downturn that struck so hard last year. Spending was highest during June in the Midwest and South -- $71 and $69 respectively -- which Gallup says is not surprising since those are the regions where ...
Opinion: The Economy Isn't as Bad as You Think
By not in system - AOL News(July 2) -- Turn on the financial stations, in fact turn on almost any news channel, and when the topic gets to the economy, it's enough to make almost everyone turn away. Doom and gloom is pretty much all you'll get. And no wonder. The stock market is down almost 15 percent since late April. Ten-year Treasury notes are yielding less than 3 percent, which is not much more than the interest rate that prevailed in very late 2008 when many thought the entire financial system and economy were on the brink of a total collapse. Meanwhile, a wide variety of economic indicators has been coming in ...
More Than Half of Workers Took a Job Hit During Recession
By Bruce Drake - Politics DailyThe recession that began 30 months ago has been one of the most "punishing" downturns since the Great Depression with 55 percent of the labor force saying it had experienced some kind of work-related hardship while the wealth of the average American household suffered its deepest decline in the post-World War 2 era, according to a Pew Research Center poll conducted May 11-31. "Of the 13 recessions that the American public has endured since the Great Depression of 1929-33, none has presented a more punishing combination of length, breadth and depth than this one," the Pew study said. The grim ...
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