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BarbarianElephant posted:They are just assuming that corrupt politicians have made bad deals, and if globalism is crushed, all the factories will come back to the USA with $30 an hour union jobs with full benefits, and no other effect on prices or the economy. And that they would still be able to buy a toaster for 20 dollars at Target at 3 AM!
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Oct 19, 2017 20:48
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WampaLord posted:The bulk of that debt is intragovernmental debt in the form of social security and t bills, money that the government owes itself essentially. Only a fraction of it is owned by foreign nations. So what does globalization mean? Someone in Galesburg, Illinois, drives to the Target across from the Sandburg Mall. This is where US-150 and US-34 meet. They are driving there right this moment, to buy a toaster. They could probably get one at Walmart, a mile or so away, but they have questions about the quality there. Target closes at 10, so they can't buy that 3 AM toaster they want, but they will pay a little extra to go to Target. On the way back, they will stop at Walmart to get some waffles, including the Pumpkin Spice waffles for their wife. We will let aside for a moment where the toaster comes from, where the gas in their car comes from, who owns the municipal bonds that paid for this road expansion. Lets just look at the "American company", Target, that he is driving too. Target is headquartered in the typical, friendly, comforting Middle American city of Minneapolis, Minnesota. But who owns Target? Luckily, the NASDAQ has this information: http://www.nasdaq.com/symbol/tgt/institutional-holdings The largest holder of Target shares, holding about 11% of the shares, is State Street Bank, the investment bank that is responsible for the "Fearless Girl" statue, and is also so large that the G20 judged it "Too Large To Fail". State Street Corp administrates "11% of the world's financial assets, totalling 29 trillion dollars", which makes the 3 billion dollars that they own of Target a rather paltry amount of money overall. (I am not up on my financials: they manage that 29 trillion dollars but don't actually own it, apparently, their own value is the relatively small 243 billion dollars, meaning that Target makes up a considerable 1% of their portfolio. And while Target is an American company owned by an American company, who owns State Street? Before we look at that, lets look at the other Top 10 shareholders of Target, who together own 55% of Target. The other top 14 owners are: Blackrock, Vanguard, Franklin Resources, Dodge & Cox, Capital World Investors, Bank of America, Duetsch Bank, Invesco Ltd, Wells Fargo, Bank of New York Mellon Company, FMR LLC, Northern Trust, Norges Bank, Highfields Capital Management. Some of those names might be familiar, while others are anonymous mutual fund companies. Of those 15 companies, only three (Duetsch Bank, Invesco Ltd and Norges Bank (which is actually the government of Norway, more or less)) are not based in the US, as far as I know. But since almost all of these are investment banks and mutual fund companies, they themselves own the stock so they can pass the money on to investors in Mutual Fund. Which brings us back to who owns State Street Bank. http://www.nasdaq.com/symbol/stt/institutional-holdings In the top 15 investors in State Street Group, we see: Vanguard, Blackrock, FMR LLC, Invesco, Bank of New York Mellon Corp. And if you open up Invesco, you will find: http://www.nasdaq.com/symbol/ivz/institutional-holdings The same mixture of big American mutual fund companies, as well as a few other companies from outside of the US. (I know this is confusing, but that is kind of the point) So when I talk about Target as being a product of globalization, it makes sense. Whatever marginal profit comes from that toaster purchase, after overhead and salary and taxes and what not, goes into the balance sheets of big mutual fund holding companies, including, "Longview Partners", based in Guernsey. And the largest shareholder of Target is a company that the world's most powerful people got together and said was "Too Big To Fail". All of which means that Target, to create shareholder value for the mutual fund companies who own it, to create value back and back through investors until you reach the King of Norway, makes its policies about how it treats the local community, how it treats its employees, based on that. None of which is news. What my point is, the person who just bought that toaster and is now heading to Wal-Mart for those waffles, never thinks of Target as a symbol of globalization. Its just a small town store, that normal, "non-elite" people shop at. The changes that it makes to the local community are just obvious things that everyone wants. And if he is a conspiracy theorist, he can imagine an America that is Made Great Again, with all of the interferences of coastal elites taken away from the simple people of the heartland, but he can't imagine that means there won't be an identical antiseptic Target every 15 miles along the freeway.
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Oct 20, 2017 01:53
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mandatory lesbian posted:target closes at 10 You are right, and 9 on Sundays. Walmart is open 24 hours.
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Oct 20, 2017 02:51
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I forgot where we were on Sears implosion news, but: http://www.chicagotribune.com/business/ct-biz-sears-edward-lampert-loan-20171020-story.html It looks like they are trying to keep it floating through the Christmas holiday. Right now they still have two months or so. My guess is still that after January, the real retail bloodbath begins. 
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Oct 22, 2017 16:44
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More bad news for Sears: http://time.com/4995060/sears-whirlpool-appliances/ They don't say what the conditions of sales were, but I imagine they might have been buying merchandise on credit without collateral.
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Oct 24, 2017 20:40
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http://money.cnn.com/2017/10/24/investing/chipotle-q3-earnings/index.html This is an interesting article because its the only article I've seen so far thats explicitly tied retail performance to Harvey and Irma. Can anyone in East Texas or Florida tell us what it looks like on the ground, like how long and how big was the disruption from the hurricanes?
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Oct 25, 2017 03:56
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Playstation 4 posted:Reading this constant ongoing argument has made me wonder what most here would call my hometown. Yellowknife is very isolated. I mean, that area kind of defines what it means to be isolated. But the thing with Yellowknife being rural is that like a lot of isolated places, you get this paradox that because people can't easily travel outside of where they are, you have more goods and services in that town. Yellowknife has things that most cities in the US or Canada of that size wouldn't have, because most people in cities of 19K wouldn't have, because they could just drive to the nearest urban hub. So in terms of retail, and also of education and medicine, Yellowknife is effectively a much larger city than most cities of under 20 thousand people. I would be really interested in visiting Yellowknife or Whitehorse.
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Oct 26, 2017 15:33
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fishmech posted:I mean, Yellowknife the municipality is like 16 square blocks of actual habitation and then 5 lightyears of empty forests and lake in every direction right? According to Google Maps, Yellowknife is two rectangles, each about 6 or 7 kilometers wide, about 50% of which is the city center and inhabited places and the other half of which is tundra. So the municipal definition of Yellowknife might be misleading. Yellowknife itself looks like a very unique town. Because it has like 10 story buildings in the center of town, which most cities of 19K don't have. But its about 1500 kilometers to the next largest city, Edmonton. Yellowknife is a pretty unique place.
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Oct 27, 2017 15:29
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https://www.cnbc.com/2017/10/27/jc-penney-slashes-2017-earnings-forecast.html JC Penney's attempts to restructure and have a sale off on old merchandise appear to be not working, or only working partially. Do we have a master list of all the big anchor mall retailers who are in trouble, and how much trouble? Because while Sears appears to be almost certainly gone, it looks like JC Penney might survive with some "restructuring" after the holiday season. I am pretty sure that there will be an acceleration of what has been happening in 2017 in 2018. What I am wondering about is how big the ripples and domino effect will be: because malls are in bad shape, and when the anchors close down, the other stores close down, the municipal tax base weakens, the unemployed retail workers have less money to spend... But right now, I don't know, because it could just mean that some malls and retail in smaller cities will close. But it could be large enough to have repercussions on the entire economy.
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Oct 27, 2017 16:00
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HEY NONG MAN posted:High end grocers in malls is an interesting idea but it seems like it would undercut the importance of the food court. I assume it would take at least a little bit of infrastructure change, since the refrigeration and plumbing and general HVAC for a grocery store isn't present in most malls. But all of that could be overcome, because grocery stores in malls are actually common, in places. Also, grocery stores have expanded until many big grocery stores are like department stores with electronics, toys, books, etc. But most grocery stores work on people coming in for staples and loss leaders. People might not drive to the mall and a high end grocery store because they are out of butter.
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Oct 27, 2017 19:05
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Baronjutter posted:What are rents like in a typical mall? This is something I believe, perhaps without having evidence for it: half of the cost of a house is plumbing, electricity, HVAC and insulation. Of course, retail has some of those things, but not the same way that a house would. Life would be a lot cheaper if we didn't have to poop, people. glowing-fish fucked around with this message at 22:11 on Oct 27, 2017 |
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Oct 27, 2017 22:08
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boner confessor posted:sort of, but not because of material costs, it's just more expensive to pay an electrician, plumber, or HVAC guy than a drywaller, a framer, or a roofer. you could probably get a whole framing crew for the cost of one qualified electrician (altho residential electric tends to be balls simple) The cost of labor is kind of the cost of most things. That is the labor theory of value.  I mean, I know that theoretically you could probably just go to Home Depot, buy a bunch of plumbing equipment for a few thousand dollars, and use it to turn a shop space into three ready to go rental units, but on the other hand, Groverhaus.
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Oct 27, 2017 22:14
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http://www.ajc.com/news/national/robots-help-stock-shelves-walmart-stores/b6rr3q3P6t9crhDzpb5RSI/ Article about Walmart adding a pilot program where robots will examine shelves and keep track of inventory. This is one thing that robots can probably do easily, and while it won't totally eliminate the job of shelver, it looks like another thing that is going to chip away at labor demand in the retail sector.
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Oct 29, 2017 21:17
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Baronjutter posted:If anyone has an empty retail situation just sort-of legalize pot and watch every single empty storefront quickly become a pot shop! I can't say that has worked or not, because the only places I've been with legal cannabis have been on the West Coast, where real estate is still in short supply. Are you from the East Coast? I am assuming you are because you say "pot"?
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Oct 31, 2017 20:40
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Noctone posted:You can't swing a cat in Denver without hitting a dispensary. Ah, in Washington State, where I lived, it was really limited (but not in a bad way). Like Vancouver, Washington with a population of 180,000 people has 18 stores total. (Some of which are under the same management). Like each store is big and organized and they look well run. Like its concentrated in a few locations, rather than anyone being able to open a marijuana store on the corner.
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Nov 1, 2017 00:26
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I think that the store probably had a good reason for what they were doing. Or at least, partially. Not having an open till before a certain hour makes a lot of sense. Things that could encourage a robbery would be putting staff and customers in danger. So even though it seems rude and inconvenient, I think it served a purpose. They should have a work around, though. That employee should have just scanned everything thorugh the U-Scan for you.
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Nov 4, 2017 18:12
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http://abcnews.go.com/Business/wireStory/list-63-sears-kmart-stores-closing-january-50919721 I don't even know whether this is yesterday's Sears closing news or today's. The news here isn't so much that a lot of Sears are going to close, or even that all Sears are going to close. I imagine that is pretty much guaranteed. My real question is, how big of a ripple effect will this have? How many malls are going to close down when Sears closes? Obviously a healthy mall isn't going to care. But there are a lot of ailing malls that are going to get knocked out by this. But how big of an effect will it have? That is the big question.
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Nov 4, 2017 23:49
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So about my questions about how big of a ripple effect the expected retail closing that will follow this holiday season could be: 1. Sears Holdings has 140,000 employees. 2. JC Penneys has 100,000 employees 3. Macy's has 150,000 employees 4. Kohl's has 140,000 employees (Any other big stores to be added to this?) Between the four of those, that is around 550,000 employees. Some of those companies might continue to exist, with "restructuring", but at least one (Sears) looks like it is going to be totally gone. But it looks like that might be a loss of 250,000 employees, total. Spread over 1-4 months, that is hardly enough to dent employment numbers. But of course, as mentioned, those stores are also the anchors for big malls. That is going to effect mall employees, and also employees at non-anchor retailers. So it looks like anywhere from 200,000 to one million jobs could be lost in the first four or five months of 2018.
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Nov 7, 2017 01:17
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Cicero posted:Very chart-heavy article on this topic today from Bloomberg: https://www.bloomberg.com/graphics/2017-retail-debt/ Thank you for posting that article, it is great! One thing that I liked about that article is it tries to explain retail problems in terms of financial markets, and not just consumer preferences. Basically, investment banks had a lot of money, and they had to do something with it, so they lent it to retail chains, who then expanded. But they overexpanded, and now they have to pay back that debt, and there wasn't ever a growth in sales to cover the capital expenses. Also, the article notes that Toys R Us is so far the largest retail bankruptcy, at 6.6 billion in assets. Sears Holdings has about 2 billion more than that. JC Penney has 3 billion more than that.
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Nov 8, 2017 19:55
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OhFunny posted:https://www.usatoday.com/story/money/2017/11/08/sears-losses/843320001/ From the article, I couldn't tell what "sell the stores" means, like just selling off the physical locations? It mentioned being able to release them. It doesn't seem like the best long term strategy, selling stores and then paying to lease them. But the market for retail lots must be really weak right now. I am reestimating Sears time to Chapter 7 Bankruptcy as... February 1st, 2018.
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Nov 9, 2017 15:16
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Owlofcreamcheese posted:Isn't the concept of having fitted clothes itself bougie. boner confessor posted:tfw you accidentally let slip how bougie you are "anyone can afford to hire a maid it's only a few hundred dollars a month" Yes.
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Nov 9, 2017 17:49
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The bourgeois grow up thinking of the retail environment, in whatever form, as something that is there to serve them. It is a place that they feel comfortable in, because they are specifically made to feel comfortable there. Which is why they downplay any difficulties to it, because they don't see those difficulties as systemic. You bought the wrong thing? Just ask the salesperson to have it exchanged! If you have experience with being unwelcome in retail, whether that is being followed in a store, having cashiers treat you rudely, having it assumed that a return is some type of scam and needing to provide proof of purchase, then you approach the experience as systemically difficult, online or offline. How do we know that they will honor your return? You don't. You are wary of what you don't know. There are always pitfalls. If you grew up in the type of comfort where you can buy shoes at Nordstroms, wear them for a week, and return them because they don't feel right, and the salespeople will act like they are honored to be speaking to you, people who are wary seem irrational. If you grow up in the type of atmosphere where your local pharmacy post signs "WE PROSECUTE ALL SHOPLIFTERS" "YOU MUST PAY FOR DRINKS BEFORE OPENING" "5 DOLLAR MINIMUM DEBIT CARD TRANSACTIONS NO EXCEPTIONS", then you approach retail as if it is the lava game...you don't want to step into the wrong place. People from these environments don't understand each other.
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Nov 9, 2017 18:33
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boner confessor posted:lol no wonder your perspective is so skewed, you're a useless middleman To be fair, lots of people are "useless middlemen". The fact that jobs aren't very productive isn't evidence against the case that lots of office space is going to be sitting empty.
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Nov 10, 2017 23:00
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I bet its really hard to find decent tortillas in the UK though. Checkmate, limeys.
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Nov 12, 2017 22:30
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JustJeff88 posted:I miss proper British savoury pies and sausage rolls and such so much, but I also miss proper poutine and tourtières from when I lived in Québec. When I lived in Montana, there was actually a place there that made local pasties. They weren't very good, but I appreciate the effort. Where were you in Montana? I miss living in Montana. My town had three large chain grocery stores, but when I liked the small IGA because it had a bakery department with cheap donuts, french bread pizza, and potato salad. The slightly less amount of bulk sizes was made up for by those cheap donuts--especially when they were in the remainder rack.
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Nov 13, 2017 17:14
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Crow Jane posted:When I worked in a restaurant, the owner was there 15 hours most every day working his rear end off, and was involved in just about every aspect of the place. That may just be the difference between an independent, somewhat upscale place and a fast food franchise, but I'd wager the place would have been a lot less successful if he'd just sat at home wanking into spreadsheets I mean, if you are in restaurant work, spreadsheets are really one of the better places to wank into.
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Nov 14, 2017 17:41
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I spent today working at Walgreen's. AMA.
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Nov 17, 2017 21:11
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The Slack Lagoon posted:Do you usually work at Walgreens or is this a one off thing? I started a new class at Walgreen's. Actually, I started it Wednesday but I didn't know that it was Walgreen's, but they explained to me that they were actually Walgreen's Boots Alliance. They have a special bus, free orange juice, and this new office building that has elevators with windows. You know, the normal day at work, phrasal verbs, prepositions, that type of thing. Edit: also, sometimes I work for companies that don't like each other and are suing each other. So, for example, a few weeks ago I heard L'Oreal's side of the story, now I hear it from the other side.
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Nov 17, 2017 22:12
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BrandorKP posted:What do you do? I thought you were a manufacturer in South America. ...did I ever say I was a manufacturer? I'm an English teacher, so I work at different companies, in different sectors.
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Nov 17, 2017 23:37
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Freakazoid_ posted:excuse me, do you have any eclipse glasses? I'm sorry, no. I just have a pair of normal sunglasses, and they are broken.
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Nov 18, 2017 00:25
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Speaking of sunglasses and retail, I really miss buying sunglasses from the Dollar Tree for one dollar.
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Nov 18, 2017 01:02
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BTW, as soon as Sears collapses, this thread is going to be renamed "Sears Dead. So What?"
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Nov 19, 2017 02:39
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learnincurve posted:Old house was bought at auction. I got a loan secured on my parents house, rather than a mortgage. It was dirt cheap because it was basically a shithole that people buy to flip or rent out. Slowly did it up, sold it at auction again, paid off the rest of the original loan and bought this bigger, nicer, house at auction with what was left. Okay, a couple questions here: 1. How did you get a loan secured on your parents house? As in, you put up your parents house as collateral? 2. Dirt cheap...can you be more specific? Are we talking $20,000, $50,000 , $100,000? 3. "Slowly did it up again"...how slowly? How much time and money did you spend to get it into shape? Like, theoretically, if someone spends $10,000 on supplies, and works 10 hours a week (on average) for two years fixing a house up, and makes $40,000 dollars profit on it, then what they have is a part-time job where they make 15,000 dollars a year. I mean, in that example, it isn't a bad deal, but I would have to know exactly how much money and time it takes to do it.
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Nov 28, 2017 05:35
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learnincurve posted:It was a risky move yes, but part of the agreement was that I took out accident and life insurance, as did my parents. Lawyers on both sides did a lot of arse covering paperwork How much did the accident and life insurance cost you? You said that it took 10 years, so over the course of that 10 years, how much did you pay for the insurance? And you mention the lawyers involved...how much did this cost in legal fees? The point isn't that this is impossible, or isn't even a good deal. The point is more that the barriers to entry are pretty high, but a person from a middle class background might not realize that this isn't an option for everybody. You have to have the money to pay lawyers, buy insurance, pay contractors, etc. And you have to know how to do all those things. So from your description, you got a loan for 50,000, paid 50,000 to contractors. (Along with the price of the lawyers and insuranc). 10 years later, you sold the house for 180,000? So that means you made about 8,000 a year. I mean, that is not a bad deal, but given the amount of capital upfront, the risks of failure or cost overrun, and the amount of time done selecting and overseeing contractors, its not an easy investment. Like, say you didn't take out a loan, and just put the 50,000 you paid out to contractors into a CD for ten years, which would involve no work and no risk, what would have been your return?
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Nov 28, 2017 17:42
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ozmunkeh posted:How many bathrooms in that CD? I think the discussion was about buying houses for investments. I mean, home ownership has a lot of pluses in terms of a sense of ownership, having a place to live, and also even if you aren't living there, some people will learn a lot of skills repairing it. That CD doesn't have a bathroom, but that also means that CD isn't going to have an exploded Septic System that costs you 2000 dollars.
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Nov 28, 2017 22:11
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More Sears news: https://www.usatoday.com/story/money/2017/11/30/sears-earnings/908265001/ Sears "cut its losses" to only 500 million in the third quarter, which is a sign of "improvement" Another source describes this in less charitable terms: https://www.thestreet.com/story/14406204/1/sears-third-quarter-earnings-were-a-disaster.html
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Nov 30, 2017 14:59
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WampaLord posted:To me, the difference is that in a hypothetical world with a livable UBI, I would literally not work at all, whereas I see a lot of people saying "Oh, no, you have to have work to do or else you'll get bored/lazy/depressed" What would you do, then? Like, I myself can't enjoy things that are totally non-productive, at least for very long. And in fact, when I do enjoy things that are totally passive, its only because I've had to work and need a break. I mean, even things like taking photographs, cooking, making charts and graphs, reading, writing...those are all "productive" things, and if I had more time, I would probably be more "productive" with them (I would cook more and invent new recipes, which I would then share). I mean, other than video games, I can't enjoy myself for long if I am not working.
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Dec 3, 2017 01:36
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So it is almost 2019, and I think the thread title needs an update. My vote is on: Sears Dead. So What? But I don't know if that fits, just yet.
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Dec 31, 2018 21:02
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