Blue Rock Cafe
Date: 13:29:29 on Monday, June 08, 2009
Name: Tarhel
Subject: Seen any Green Shoots?
The Great Recession appears to be bottoming out. Economic “green shoots” include improved consumer confidence, slight increase in consumer spending, reduced weekly job lost numbers, small increase in retail sales by some stores (McDonalds, Dollar Store and Wal-Mart), and ironically, increases in oil prices which indicates more demand. Economists disagree about whether or not consumer spending is up from last year.
Gun sales are still increasing; ammunition is hard to find; and applications for concealed carry permits are way up from last year. Pregnancy rates are also up, as are condom sales, as people stay home rather than go out for entertainment. Cheap wine and beer sales are up, but watch out for new taxes on alcohol. Car sales rose a little, perhaps due to people taking advantage of fire sales by discontinued dealerships. Existing home sales are up a little too, in part due to sales of foreclosed properties.
In my region, new apartment buildings are rising--perhaps more people are renting in response to the difficulty of obtaining a mortgage on a house. The local Coast Guard base is expanding--so in addition to the construction jobs, private contractors are hiring skilled technicians to work on the base. Wal-Mart is hiring, and the strip mall around Wal-Mart is expanding as new small retail businesses sprout. Companies are advertising for salespeople and truck drivers.
We have seen an explosion of Vietnamese nail salons—someone must be running a training school to help ESL Vietnamese pass the state exams. More local fruits and vegetables are available at the local farmers markets--and more farmers markets are opening.
The tourist industry is still iffy, but last minute rentals of beach cottages is up, but often at discounted rates. The hope is that people who might have gone on cruises or flown to the Islands, will drive to the beach instead--but the big “if” is can they even afford a scaled-down vacation? Perhaps rentals will pick up as the summer progresses.
What green economic shoots are you seeing in your neck of the woods?
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Gremlin 01:02:45 06/14/2009
Uncle Bill 13:29:18 06/09/2009