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Holiday Shopping Blues

2012 SEASON LIKELY TO DISAPPOINT Despite huge gains registered during a record-breaking Black Friday, America’s retail economy still struggled to get shoppers to open their wallets this year – leading to what could be the worst holiday shopping season since the beginning of the “Great Recession” in 2008. According to…

2012 SEASON LIKELY TO DISAPPOINT

Despite huge gains registered during a record-breaking Black Friday, America’s retail economy still struggled to get shoppers to open their wallets this year – leading to what could be the worst holiday shopping season since the beginning of the “Great Recession” in 2008.

According to fresh data from a MasterCard Advisors SpendingPulse report (which tracks the sale of popular holiday items including clothing, electronics and jewelry), holiday sales in November and December increased by just 0.7 percent from 2011.

That’s obviously well below the 4-5 percent growth analysts were expecting – and if it holds, would mark the lowest increase in four years.

This lump of coal for the U.S. economy was delivered on Christmas Day – not long after retail research firm ShopperTrak downgraded its 2012 holiday growth forecast from 3.3 to 2.5 percent.

What the hell happened?Remember numbers from the extended Black Friday weekend – the traditional post-Thanksgiving holiday shopping kickoff – were positively stratospheric.

Where did the momentum go?

Over the cliff, apparently … the “fiscal cliff.”

While Democrats and “Republicans” in Washington, D.C. bicker and argue over the extent to which the are going to raise the nation’s tax burden – beyond the looming Obamacare tax hikes, that is – the economy is reacting the only way it knows how.

It is withdrawing …

That’s too bad. This could have been a much stronger holiday shopping season – one that propelled the U.S. economy into 2013 on a high note. Unfortunately, our leaders’ ongoing refusal to acknowledge their spending addiction – and their insistence that we pay its ever-escalating tab – has once again served as an anchor to economic growth.

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16 comments

BigT December 26, 2012 at 6:25 am

Not sure why ANYONE is, or should be, Suprised…

Obama won the election, but that’s it …He has given us NOTHING to believe that he will do anything (even if he had a clue) to fix the mess he made in his first failed term…

It’s like getting a degree…Liberals have topped out when they get the diploma. While the rest of us have to Start pulling the wagon after we graduate…we know that’s when the work begins…

For the Left, there is no Accountability once you, and the media, have fooled the masses….

And when your life is based on Myths, Fables and Lies, as liberalsim is…no need to provide any answers…and offering leadership is only a trap to more demonstrate what a failure you are..

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Thebeachisback December 26, 2012 at 4:05 pm

Can you define democracy?

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Thomas December 26, 2012 at 6:12 pm

Democracy: A poll of British parents showed that topping the list of children’s most-requested Christmas gifts was a sibling (Britain’s birth rate is below replacement levels, with most non-immigrant British children not having a sibling). Slightly lower down on the list was a “dad” – Britain’s single motherhood rate is 21 percent. “Less than half” of single parents have a job, and most live off of state assistance. Seventy percent of the criminals in Britain come from one-parent homes.

In the United States, the birth rate is just above replacement levels – barely. And the single motherhood rate is skyrocketing, with half of all births to women under 30 now out of wedlock, and 73 percent of all black children born out of wedlock (compared with 29 percent of white children). Illegitimacy is highly correlative with poverty in the United States, just as it is in Britain.

breitbart.com/Big-Peace/2012/12/25/poll-kids-father-sibling

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BradWarthenSucks December 26, 2012 at 9:35 am

Tell that to the gun dealers. They’re all out Ferrari shopping thanks to Obama and Feinstein (NRA co-gun salesman of the year).

2013 is going to be an interesting year. If we go over the financial cliff, or even a portion of it people are going to lock their credit cards away. If the high capacity magazine ban goes into effect… which I believe it will, people are going to start wondering “what next”? and tighten their belts even further. I expect the stock market to drop 20% in the upcoming year. That’s not even bring up what Obamacare is going to do to the job market. 2013 could be the new, but uglier 1929 because there are so many more people dependent on the government providing for them and are unable to do anything for themselves.

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Thomas December 26, 2012 at 10:06 am

Wow, seeing the massive crowds out shopping the last two weeks makes stories like this tough to believe.

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Frank Pytel December 26, 2012 at 10:22 am

You’re correct. There were massive crowds. They just aren’t spending.

Coupled with the fact that the minor increase in spending doesn’t even begin to keep pace with inflation and wages tells the basic truth. Spending was down.

Have a Great Day!! :) There won’t be many left with the Demlicans and Republicrats in charge.

Frank Pytel

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BradWarthenSucks December 26, 2012 at 10:29 am

I went to two different houses yesterday for Christmas and didn’t see any “over the top” gifts exchanged. I think people took a more practical perspective this year.

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LIVE ACTION !!! December 26, 2012 at 12:47 pm

Most everybody I know is on a much tighter budget this Christmas, and the others are just holding off on spending due to the uncertainty of what 2013 will bring.You are right tho, lots of people out.

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BigT December 26, 2012 at 11:40 am

With 10% unemployment, and a Cluess, Hateful president…we’ll suffer until we can change the Senate, and maybe Force Obama to be AMERICAN…

Bush was GREAT for the Economy…yet you have DUMB@$$#$ who still deny that…even w/ the Disaster Obama (is and) has been…

Ignorant people deserve Obama…I Don’t….

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Thebeachisback December 26, 2012 at 4:07 pm

Bush was NOT great forthe economy! My 401K was wrecked during the Bush years! You are living in a hole–asshole!

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Good December 26, 2012 at 12:40 pm

Americans are continuing to shed debt…a good thing. The Fed Govt should have been doing the same, but did not to the detriment of our collective future. However, there is hope yet in the “cliff.”

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Math a magician December 26, 2012 at 1:09 pm

Shed debt all you want, for every dollar you wipe off your revolving credit the FED GUBMENT is racking it up for you X10.

$52,000 and some change last I checked, for every air breathing American and who knows how many dead ones as well.

If you can’t beat em, join em – just don’t get your timing off or you will be ——— screwed.

Send guns, money and lawyers daddy, I didn’t know she was with the Russians tooooooo…..

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Math a magician December 26, 2012 at 1:13 pm

Lawyers, guns and money, dad get me out of this….Warren Zevon

ranks right up there with

If I had a rocket launcher -Bruce Cockburn

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BigT December 26, 2012 at 1:48 pm

Thanks to Obama the Religious Murderous of Jihad HAVE a Rocket Launcher…

And if they use it to kill us…Obama will just blame a video, and beg Sharia to forgive us for being American and Free….

How long before the day that the Majority figures out what the ignorant have done to our country..and begs God for forgiveness…

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Psych 101 December 26, 2012 at 2:04 pm

So, what do you Obama to do? Kill every non Christian in the middle east, or just every Muslim?

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TetleyT December 26, 2012 at 9:31 pm

Is it just me, or… might one infer that there is something inherently dysfunctional in an economy whose health is so dependent on annual discretionary spending increases in recognition of the birth of a particular religion’s Lord and Savior?

Okay, so maybe it is just me. Sound economic principles are in play here. Carry on.

Reply

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