April 19, 2009
With a record low US dollar, and high energy costs, will retail sales decline to usher in the recession?
Chi Guy asked:
Although we are in the beginnings of a recession, average consumers have not been slapped by reality yet. Will a slump in retail sales occur and shed light on Bush’s devalued dollar recession?
PNAC ~ Penelopea (below) Which voodoo economics book do you recomend? lol
Although we are in the beginnings of a recession, average consumers have not been slapped by reality yet. Will a slump in retail sales occur and shed light on Bush’s devalued dollar recession?
PNAC ~ Penelopea (below) Which voodoo economics book do you recomend? lol
America is a nation of consumers versus exporters by a thousand to one. You actualy swallow the neo-con claim that exports will offset a slump in consumer spending? LOLOLOL
Charles
People are still spending but not cash on credit cards. I think it will all fall when people run out of available credit.
I have news for you…a low dollar means US exports will increase and retail sales will surge due to foreign demand. Go read an economics book. Any basic book will do.
“You actualy swallow the neo-con claim that exports will offset a slump in consumer spending?”
Geee, I never said anything like that. I only pointed out that as our currency lowers in value compared to those of other countries, the consumers in those countries will purchase more of our exports to save money. This is BASIC economics, not your so called voodoo economics.
If you think I am wrong, prove my above statement false (but do so without putting words in my mouth or changing my very simple argument). Good luck.
Only if the perception of a recession is believed enough for consumers to change their spending habits, and thereby creating the reality of a recession.
No because exports will go up with the cheap dollar.
I think the middle class will spend for christmas as always and january will have record layoffs then slip from there
uhhh the stock market just hit a record high like two weeks ago
Seriously, people are already living way beyond their means and you want retail sales to boom?
The past 2 elections where I live citizens have voted for every spending measure on the ballot. This also reflects the way they manage their personal lives.
Americans have the lowest savings rate of any industrialized nation. We buy too much crap we do not really need putting ourselves into debt. All this easy money created a lot of false demand that inflated many markets. Stupid people did this not the government.
Besides in my personal business a loss in US sales has been offset by a huge increase in international sales.
Like the recession Clinton started his last year in office?
Recession when your neighbor loses his job
Depression when you lose yours.
Company I am working for will close this year with the third year of record orders.
Today I could have stopped and bought a sandwich for lunch, but I didn’t. I went home and made a sandwich….I decided that since I planned to eat out tonight i just didn’t want to burn through the extra five buck. Why? Because I had just filled my tank and it cost eight more dollars than the last time I filled up. A small thing, but even I, Mr. Eat Out A Lot, cut back on a purchase. I can only imagine how this gradual financial garrot has affected folks a bit less fortunate than I. I’d say that at this rate, by election time, people are going to have to make some real decisions based on their own self interest. Either continue the current policies that favor the trans-national corporations, or elect people that are more on the side of the Amercan wage-earner. The ‘trickle down’ idea may have had some merit at one time, but that was then and this is now….and now way to many of our brothers and sisters are taking it in the shorts…a little at a time; it’s adding up! Poverty may be the result of some personal decisions, but a lot of a country’s prosperity has to do with its fiscal and monetary polices. If the government favors the already well to do at the expense of the wage earner then the wage-earner suffers. Don’t think this can’t happen to you….’If they come for me in the morning, they’ll come for you by night’!
Anyone with any sense will cut back on their spending,especially on credit cards. It is amazing how much less we can spend. I think there will be a lower slump in sales,especially this holiday season. I hope we do not have a recession but it looks that way. Good question Chi.
For those that keep the mantra that weak dollar = higher exports, that is only partially true. What most people forget is the 9 Trillion in debt and the fact that we can’t compete with China in manufacturing. The average american would have to make something like 4 thousand dollars a year to compete with them. It won’t happen. Plus, we continue to cut taxes and SPEND MORE. We can’t have it both ways. I hope taking serious steps to strengthen the dollar is the next administrations priority.
this is my take to avoid recession
1) charge a special tax of 1 dollar per person per day for paying off the debt thats 30 dollars a month for a year
2) the banks should cut int rates on credit card business and personal loans to stimulate growth
3) ending the iraq war by 2009
4) giving people tax benefits on using bio fuels ,importing lot of sugarcane from Caribbean countries and going sugarcane based ethanol
hey i don’t know whether it would work or not but it is worth a try