Economy Archives - Page 5 of 7 - NorthStar Capital Advisors

Thanksgiving Dinner Up 37 Cents

This year’s turkey dinner will cost you an extra $0.37 compared to last year. The average cost of a classic Thanksgiving Dinner for 10 people is $49.41 according to the American Farm Bureau Federation’s survey. That’s a 37-cent or 0.8% price increase from last year.

The bird soaks up the lion’s share of the budget at 44% of the meal’s cost. The 16-pound turkey came in at $21.65 this year or $1.35 per pound. The biggest year-over-year change on a percentage basis were the miscellaneous ingredients whose cost increased 8.7%. The stuffing contributed the biggest percentage drop at -4.9%.

The average cost of a turkey dinner has hovered around $49 since 2011. The relative price stability of the turkey index mirrors the government’s Consumer Price Index for food eaten at home which increased 3% compared to last year.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Source: AFBF

Low Inflation, Flatter COLA

The Social Security Administration on Wednesday announced a 1.7% annual cost-of-living adjustment, or COLA, for the nearly 64 million Americans who receive federal retirement or disability benefits. The increase would result in about a $22-a-month increase for the average retiree. Increases have been between 1.5% and 1.7% for three straight years.

The benefit increase in 2015 matches the 1.7% gain in consumer prices in September, compared to a year earlier, according to Labor Department data also released Wednesday.

source: WSJ

Where Your 2013 Tax Dollar Went

On April 15, 2014, millions of Americans filed their income taxes for 2013. This chart shows how each one of your income tax dollars was spent by the federal government in fiscal year 2013.

American’s Wealth at Fresh High

Americans’ wealth hit the highest level ever last year reflecting a surge in the value of stocks and homes. A record-setting rally of +30% in the U.S. stock market drove most of the past year’s gains.

According to a Federal Reserve report released today, the net worth of U.S. households and nonprofit organizations rose 14% last year.

The Fed’s report shows that Americans have made good progress on repairing the damage caused by the housing crash and the recession (Dec 2007 – Jun 2009). Americans have been reducing their debt loads and regaining equity in their homes.

Source: Wall Street Journal

What’s a Mom Worth?

Stay-at-home moms work an average of 94 hours a week and would collect a “mom salary” of $113,586 a year.

Working mothers spend 40 hours a week at the office, but then come home

and perform an average of 58 hours per week on household and childcare duties.

“The Twelve Days of Christmas” Tab Costs $27,393

The collective cost of items featured in the “The Twelve Days of Christmas” rose 7.7% over last year, according to PNC Financial, to $27,393.

For 30 years PNC has compiled the Christmas Price Index. Since the index was first compiled in 1983, year-over-year inflation increases have averaged 2.9%.

For this year, the price to hire nine ladies dancing rose the most, 20%, while 10 lords a-leaping jumped 10%.

Here’s a breakdown of the cost of the twelve gifts:

One partridge in a pear tree: $200
Two turtledoves: $125
Three French hens: $165
Four calling birds: $600
Five gold rings: $750
Six geese: $210
Seven swans: $7,000
Eight milking maids: $58 (if they’re paid the federal minimum wage of $7.25 an hour)
Nine ladies dancing: $7,553
Ten leaping lords: $5,243
Eleven pipers piping: $2,635
Twelve drummers: $2,855

Note: The drummers, dancing ladies, leaping lords, piping pipers are rented, not bought.

Source: PNC

Women Choosing Lower-Paying Jobs

Three weeks ago we wrote about The Most and Least Lucrative College Majors. An interesting aspect on this topic is the propensity for women to select lower-paying jobs. NPR’s Lisa Chow covered the story recently (Why Women (Like Me) Choose Lower-Paying Jobs).

Women are overrepresented among majors that don’t pay very well (psychology, art, comparative literature), and underrepresented in lots of lucrative majors (most fields in engineering).

Household Income Levels Off After Hitting Two-Decade Low

The Census Bureau released the latest snapshot of how U.S. living standards are evolving. The Census report, viewed as a gauge of American prosperity, could mark a turning point for the recovery. Here’s some takeaways:

The income of the typical U.S. family stabilized last year for the first time since the recession.
The bottoming-out follows four years of declines that pushed incomes to their lowest levels in nearly two decades.
Consumers may soon feel the benefits of an improving job market that has seen unemployment drop from a peak of 10% to 7.3% this August.
A rally in stocks also has boosted incomes for some Americans, along with rebounding real-estate prices.

Health-care Inflation at Slowest Pace in 50 Years

The prices paid for medical care in July rose just 1% from a year earlier, the slowest annual rate of growth since the early 1960s, according to Commerce Department data. Health-care increases now trail overall inflation, which itself has been historically slow in recent years. The recent slowdown in medical inflation is partly the result of less-generous health plans forcing patients to pay more attention to prices, doctors say.

CNBC Core Viewership Drops to 20-Year Low — Why that’s a good thing!

Click to zoom

According to the latest Nielsen data, CNBC’s prime viewership (age 25-54 demographic) just tumbled to a fresh 20 year low of just 37,000, the lowest since March 1993. CNBC’s Fast Money (fell 32% vs previous year), Mad Money (fell 42% year-over-year) and Kudlow (fell 52% year-over-year) all had all time low ratings in the “all viewers” category in August 2013.

So why is this a good thing?

This is good news for individual investors and their advocates because it means less people are being negatively influenced by CNBC’s misinformation.

CNBC’s goal is not to make you money, but to sell advertising.They want you to live in fear and react to every little hiccup in the market so that you’re glued to their network in order to receive investment advice from their guests and anchors. But if you make just one move to improve your portfolio’s performance this year, it should be turning off CNBC. In fact, you should tune out most of the financial media.

If you’re invested for the long haul, it really doesn’t matter…

If inflation is up two-tenths of a percentage point this year,
Or if the Consumer Confidence Index dips 3%,
Or if the Bull Bear Sentiment Indicator switches from bullish to bearish.

Your portfolio should be positioned to withstand good times and bad. You shouldn’t be jumping in and out of the market or sectors based on news, politics, the economy, or any other event.

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