The Economist published an interesting rundown on changes in consumer spending during 2007-2010. Nothing earth-shattering, but there's a few noteworthy outliers:
"Processed vegetables" (I read this as canned food) - has increased in real dollars, but the jump in nominal dollars is what's really scary. We may be trying to be "healthier", but more likely I think poorer people are priced out of fresh and are switching to canned, which is also not cheap these days. Ominous.
Real spending on tobacco, as the article notes, is way down. That's good I guess. I wonder how much is health-driven, and how much is due to a spat of statewide public smoking bans in the past few years?
Spending on eating out has dropped dramatically in terms of real dollars, and interestingly in similar proportion to spending on alcohol.
Utilities/home fuel spending is way way up, reflecting higher oil prices and a stressed electrical grid, most likely.
Last tidbit: Spending on gasoline and clothing both decreased overall, but both showed parallel decreases in real and nominal spending. This indicates to me that consumption parallels price changes in an almost 1:1 manner, but that could be a red herring. I am, after all, not an economist.
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