The rise of the dollar store – catering to a disappearing middle class with shrinking incomes has made dollar stores prosper in the last decade. In last decade Family Dollar grew by 62 percent in store count while U.S. population only went up by 8 percent.
Dollar stores for most Americans carry an odd sort of stigma. In the past, these locations were seen as shopping hubs for the poor only. Yet as we all know many in the once strong American middle class were thrown off the prosperity treadmill and into lower income brackets. While companies struggle with growing dollar [...]
Austerity nation – 45 million Americans on food assistance programs. Americans shopping at discount dollar stores confronting the realities of a shrinking dollar and disappearing middle class.
From November to December of 2010 487,000 Americans were added to the food stamp program. Keep in mind this all occurred while the stock market continued to soar and has rallied nearly 100 percent from the lows reached in March of 2009. Working and middle class Americans barely have enough to pay for the monthly [...]
The Food Bubble – the financial cost of feeding the world. Feeding 219,000 more people every night. Wheat prices up 8 percent for the year.
The word bubble has taken on an entirely new meaning thanks to the global housing bubble. Yet we have experienced bubbles in other areas outside of real estate. During the 1990s the nation experienced a technology bubble. That was followed shortly by a housing bubble. Both of these have burst. Yet we still have other [...]
