Tagged with 'econ'
It's the economy, stupid
Hidden in the intro to this BusinessWeek article - ostensibly about the health-care industry - is an jaw-dropping nugget of information. See if you find it:
If you really want to understand what makes the U.S. economy tick these days, don’t go to Silicon Valley, Wall Street, or Washington. Just take a short trip to your local hospital. Park where you don’t block the ambulances, and watch the unending flow of doctors, nurses, technicians, and support personnel. You’ll have a front-row seat at the health-care economy.
For years, everyone from politicians on both sides of the aisle to corporate execs to your Aunt Tilly have justifiably bemoaned American health care—the out-of-control costs, the vast inefficiencies, the lack of access, and the often inexplicable blunders.
But the very real problems with the health-care system mask a simple fact: Without it the nation’s labor market would be in a deep coma. Since 2001, 1.7 million new jobs have been added in the health-care sector, which includes related industries such as pharmaceuticals and health insurance. Meanwhile, the number of private-sector jobs outside of health care is no higher than it was five years ago.
Did you catch it? Here, let me highlight it for you:
the number of private-sector jobs outside of health care is no higher than it was five years ago
Or, phrase it the other way around:
the only sector that produced any net new jobs in the U.S. economy between 2001 and 2006 was health care
For even more mind-boggling details, read the latest installment in CJR’s series on the looming general election, which links a number of reports on the state of the US economy.
Shorter version: it’s much, much worse than I thought.
George Speaks, Badly - New York Times
Fun, if slightly snarky (and a little late?) op-ed by Gail Collins in yesterday's NYT:
We’re really past expecting anything much, but in times of crisis you would…
Heavy weighs the head, indeed
We saw The Queen this weekend (at a packed house - I can't remember the last time we saw a movie on opening weekend.)
The movie focuses on the royal family in…
NYT on Organic Wal-Mart
The NYT has an excellent article on new organic trends at Wal-Mart and the economic impact. The entire article is worth reading, but here's my favorite nugget:…
Starbucks Economics
The difficulty is that if some of your products are cheap, you may lose money from customers who would willingly have paid more. So, businesses try to discourage their more lavish customers…