All Articles Tagged "economic recovery"
Study Claims Boost In Alcohol Sales Means Americans Are More Confident About The Economy
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People are feeling so good about the economy, they are celebrating by having a little wine with dinner. It seems there has been a boost in liquor sales at restaurants and bars and it’s all due to the economic recovery, speculates to a new study.
Having just come through the deepest U.S. recession since World War II, more Americans are drinking. Beer, wine, and spirits sales in restaurants, bars and other licensed locations increased 4.9 percent in 2011, according to a study by restaurant research firm Technomic. In dollars, this equals $93.7 billion in sales last year. And there are more drinks to go around. Beer imports into the U.S. also increased 6.5 percent this year, writes The Huffington Post.
Even in hard times Americans tend to continue to enjoy alcoholic beverages. But they tend to enjoy them at home. While alcohol sales fell in restaurants and bars, liquor sales at stores and supermarkets increased 1.2 percent, found a report by consumer research firm Mintel. CNNMoney data shows that in 2010, when unemployment grew to be as large as 9.6 percent, alcohol sales jumped 9 percent.
Drinks, anyone?
Housing Market on Upswing: New Data Shows Home Prices Jumped
AP Photo/Paul Sakuma
The housing market may be turning the corner. In September, home prices rose the most in six years.
“U.S. home prices jumped 5% in September compared with a year ago, the largest year-over-year increase since July 2006,” reports USA Today. The data, which points to a housing recovery, comes from CoreLogic, a provider of consumer, financial and property information, analytics and services to business and government.
This is good news. In fact, states the newspaper, “Steady price increases should give the housing market more momentum when home sales pick up in the spring. Rising prices encourage more homeowners to sell their homes and entice would-be buyers to purchase homes before prices rise further.”
The recovery seems to be nearly nationwide, as prices increased in all but seven states. And in just 18 of 100 large cities, they declined, as indicated by the report. Home prices rose in some of the states that were hardest hit by the housing bust. In Arizona, for example, prices for houses were boosted by 18.7 percent over the past year. Meanwhile in Idaho, which saw the second greatest increase, prices jumped 13.1 percent, found CoreLogic.
There were some drops reported– Rhode Island (3.5 percent) and Illinois (2.3 percent).
Because the market seems to be turning around, “home builders started construction on new homes and apartments at the fastest pace in more than four years in September,” states the USA Today article. “They also requested the most building permits in four years, a sign that many are confident that home sales gains will continue.”
Exit polling last night indicates that a feeling of overall economic improvement was a factor in voter support for President Obama. Forty percent of those surveyed said they thought the economy was on an upswing. “But in a much tighter race than the one that first swept Obama into the White House, the president hung onto his key demographics of women, young people, blacks and Hispanics,” the AP reports.
President Obama On Recovering from the “Worst Financial and Economic Crisis In Our Lifetimes”
Image: AP
Each day it seems, President Obama is answering questions about The Great Recession, whether or not the economy is getting better, and what we’re doing to make that happen. He answered those questions directly for Black Enterprise EIC Derek T. Dingle.
“The African American community ends up being hurt during recessionary times more than the population at large,” the President said during the exclusive interview. “[The] African American unemployment rate is still way too high. You had a credit crunch for small- and medium-sized businesses that disproportionately impacted African American businesses. But part of what we have been able to do is to specifically focus on disadvantaged businesses, disadvantaged communities.”
President Obama also talks about the administration’s support for black entrepreneurs, unemployment in the black community, and the impact of predatory lending.
“I told every single member of my cabinet, ‘I want you to increase transparency, simplify the process, make sure that the goals that we have for small, minority-, women-, and veteran-owned businesses are prioritized inside your agency, and think about other ways that we can break up these contracts into smaller pieces so that smaller businesses could actually bid for them,’” President Obama added.
The Presidential election is in full swing with fewer than 100 days left until we head to the voting booths. For more from President Obama about these important issues, visit BlackEnterprise.com.
Report: New York's Economic Recovery Nets Few Jobs
(Wall Street Journal) — A new report on New York’s economic performance during the recovery from the recession throws open the question as to whether the state has experienced much of an economic recovery at all. There is good news on the broad health of the New York economy, but the report released Wednesday by the Fiscal Policy Institute offers a surprisingly bleak snapshot of the state’s jobs market. One in every seven New Yorkers is unemployed, and long-term unemployment has reached record levels. New York’s jobless rate of 8%, which has been dropping, is also “deceiving,” according to the report.
More Stimulus May Be on the Way
(AP) — Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke said Wednesday that the central bank is prepared to provide additional stimulus if the current economic lull persists. Delivering his twice-a-year economic report to Congress, Bernanke laid out three options the central bank would consider. Bernanke said the Fed could launch another round of Treasury bond buying, the third such effort since 2009. It could cut the interest paid to banks on the reserves they hold as a way to encourage them to lend more. The Fed could also be more explicit in spelling out just how long it planned to keep rates at record-low levels. That would give investors confidence about the Fed’s efforts to continue supporting the economy.
No Rush to Hire Even as Profits Soar
(Wall Street Journal) — Corporate profits are humming, dividend increases are up sharply and the Dow Jones Industrial Average is back above 12000. It makes job growth the missing link as the U.S. economy mounts a rebound. With 73% of the Standard & Poor’s 500-stock index by market value having reported fourth-quarter results, earnings are up 28% from a year earlier and sales are up 7.7%. But the contrast between profit and job growth remains a big hurdle for companies hoping to keep expanding their business. ”I am cautiously optimistic that we will see continued improvement in 2011. It’s just that it’s hard to see sustained growth until the housing market and unemployment improve,” said MasterCard Inc. Chief Executive Ajay Banga last week.
Will Bigger Paychecks Bring a Better Economy?
(Washington Post) — As a key piece of President Obama’s signature tax-cut package begins boosting paychecks this month, American workers will confront a critical question that could determine the pace of country’s economic recovery: Spend or save? One of the most visible components of the $858 billion plan passed by Congress is a 2-percentage-point reduction in the federal payroll tax for all workers that will last through the year. The administration hopes the increase in take-home pay – about $1,000 for an average family, according to White House estimates – will boost consumer spending, which in turn drives the nation’s economy.
D.C.’s Ward 8 Pins Its Hopes for Economic Improvement on Mayor-Elect Gray
(Washington Post) — Mary Cuthbert, who describes herself as a “seasoned citizen,” doesn’t shy away from telling people what she really thinks. And having lived in the District’s Congress Heights neighborhood in Ward 8 for 25 years, Cuthbert said she’s tired of watching other areas of the city flourish with new shops, businesses and public transportation options. But after Ward 8 gave Mayor-elect Vincent C. Gray overwhelming support in the Sept. 14 Democratic primary, Cuthbert thinks her luck is about a change.
Recovery Brings No Respite for NY’s Poor
(Crain’s) — A survey of low-income New Yorkers shows that half have less than $500 in savings to fall back on and one-third have no savings at all. The annual survey, commissioned by the Community Service Society of New York, defines low-income New Yorkers as those earning less than 200% of the federal poverty level, or less than $44,100 for a family of four. It presents an unforgiving picture of how hard life can be for poor New Yorkers, detailing hardships ranging from difficulty paying for medical care to finding enough work.
Stimulating African American Economic Development: Lessons from G.M.
(Washington Informer) — President Barack Obama reached another significant milestone on the long difficult road toward economic recovery of the economy in the United States when General Motors (G.M.) recently launched one of the largest initial public offerings (IPO) in American history. I believe that the proper stimulus investment in the African American business community will also bring a much-needed economic recovery. To the astounded pseudo-economists and near-sighted politicians who vociferously criticized President Obama for using federal stimulus funds to reorganize and stabilize G.M., the fact is the stimulus worked. The investment of taxpayers’ dollars worked to save G.M. jobs and to catalyze a financial rebirth of G.M.
