Wednesday, October 15, 2014

Pop Quiz: Furniture Sales

The following chart shows the 12 month moving average of retail sales at furniture and home furnishings stores as a percentage of wage and salary disbursements.


Click to enlarge.

It does not include the pitiful sales for September released today (due to not having wage and salary disbursement data for September yet). As seen in the chart, does it really matter though?

Which answer best describes the data?

1. Strong recovery!
2. Fed rate hike imminent!
3. Ebola fully explains the drop!
4. Hedge funds will soon gamble on furniture too! No worries!
5. The future's so bright, I gotta wear shades!
6. All of the above!

What? You want another choice? Seriously? Okay, okay. For the life of me I can't understand why you need one though. Are you not drinking the Kool-Aid?

7. F@#%ing new normal. Clown horn! Ugh. Deep sigh. :(



Source Data:
St. Louis Fed: Custom Chart

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

You missed the obvious answer - wages are too damn high! If wages go down, that ratio jumps like a frog in heat.

Stagflationary Mark said...

Anonymous,

Good point.

If we can get wages to zero while selling a single chair made in China to one guy with a credit card, we make it to infinity and win the game! Woohoo! ;)

Sigh.

Anonymous said...

If we can get wages to zero,,,

Give the government some time. They are working on it. What's the parabolic trend on the Labor Participation Rate? Labor Free in 2023?

Stagflationary Mark said...

Anonymous,

In 2021, you will need a gun
In 2022, nobody left to sue
In 2023, we'll be labor free
In 2024, can you take much more?
In 2025, stocks still not a buy
In 2026, new high on the VIX

It's the 99 Bottles of Jeer on the Wall Street song!