Archive for January 2017

Dividing the number of cars made domestically by the number of cars sold here provides the US auto production percentage. Tesla wins as it exports almost half its cars so its percentage is 196%. BMW follows at 116%, then Ford at 96%, Daimler at 86%, GM at 83%, Honda at 81%, and Fiat-Chrysler at 69%.…

Friday’s report showing a 0.6% rise in December retail spending was solid. While retail sales grew just 3.3% in CY16 and department store sales fell 5.6%, it’s because internet sales jumped 1.3% in December and 11.4% in CY16! Bears point to December sales rising a disappointing 0.2% excluding autos, but autos accounts for 20% of…

The Friday File: While there are many business models used by retail clothing stores, such as fast fashion (H&M), haute couture, pret-a-porte, single-label (Polo), height & weight specific, discount (Marshall’s), and others, all involve a mark-up. I suggest that the best way to estimate mark-up is by looking at the density of clothes on the…

Economists frequently talk about annual GDP growth and whether it will be 2% or 2.5% or 3%. These may seem like very small differences, but over time they are huge. Assuming population growth is 1%/year, it takes an excruciating 70 years for living standards to double if GDP growth is 2%/year, only 35 years if…

The male labor force participation rate for those aged 25-54 has fallen from 97.9% in 1954 to 88%. With a Bachelor’s degree or more the rate is 94%, for those with some college the rate’s 88%, and for those with a HS diploma or less it’s 83%. Not coincidentally, the percentage of those employed in…

The total US debt is $19.9 trillion. Of that, $5.5 trillion is owned by the government (like the Social Security Trust Fund) and $14.4 is held by the public. Of the public part, $6.175 trillion is held by foreigners. Japan holds the most US debt at $1.13 trillion, followed by China at $1.12 trillion. Then…

While December job creation was mildly disappointing at 156,000, the real story was the large 0.4% rise in monthly wage growth and the 2.9% rise in Y-o-Y wage growth, the largest Y-o-Y gain since 6/09. Moreover, job gains for October and November were revised upwards by 19,000, the broadest measure of unemployment fell to 9.2%,…

The Friday File: The top 25 last names now cover 8.7% of US the population, up from 8.6% in 2000. Similarly, the most popular 239 last names cover one-quarter of the population, down from 244 in 2000. Smith remains the most popular name, with 2.44 million users. The only new top 10 last name is…

In 2015, the percentage of those 18 to 34 living with their parents was 39.5%, the highest level since 1940 when it was 40.9%. Of course, 1940 was one year removed from the end of the Depression. The rate then fell to an all-time low of 24.1% in 1960 and has slowly risen since with…