The U.S. economy seems to be improving, even though the Obama administration is pushing up energy prices by making coal fired power plants unprofitable. The huge supplies of natural gas and cheap petroleum brought about by the fracking revolution in the U.S. and OPEC’s response of pumping more crude to drive the fracking operations out of business because of oversupply seem to have mitigated the expected increases in energy costs for the moment. But that does not mean that the economy is healthy, and the indications coming from China suggest that we could be in for another world-wide disruption that could be even worse than the great recession of 2009.
The US economy has only been supported by the vast money printing, known as quantitative easing, and the suppression of interest rates. The feds raised rates last month after nearly a decade and will be forced to suppress them again. We have and enormous, completely unrepayable debt that cannot tolerate a rise in rates. We will see another crash this year of historic proportions and it will be followed by a lowering of rates, if it doesn’t happen beforehand, and another squashing of rates.
Wal-mart just announced that they will be cutting 269 stores from their roster, beginning February 1st. Add this to the 6,000 other retail stores closures. The retail apocolypse continues.
Wal-Mart reports that it will try to place those workers into stores in the surrounding areas, though that will not be feasible for all. This is the first mass closing of stores for Wal-Mart in over two decades, and analysts are trying to determine if this is simply a strategic re-positioning, or an indication of other problems.
More on Wal-Mart strategy, page 2
I concur
Anna Jeffrey, Daniel Moses
Close them i dont shop there anyway.
I hate when I go into a Walmart & find out that they only sell groceries !
FEMA…all I gotta say
Wake up sheeple…
Lol. Walmart first of all, is not a job that requires skill. It’s like fast food, if you want higher wages, then get some training and move on.
I read all these comments about how bad Walmart is. They have a great business plan first of all. They hire a lot of unskilled labor. And for all the talk about Walmart, people still pack those stores everyday. Mom an pop stores are great and can be very personal, but prices reflect it!
They just posted last week they will now offer halal meats and conform to offer other Muslim items.
Who’s lost??
Didn’t they raise their minimum wage?