Much of tthis list is anecdotal as consumer spending has shifted to online purchasing. We don’t even go to PetSmart anymore, since the kitty food is cheaper in online bulk. I can’t remember the last time i went Christmas shopping at a mall, yet, my spending is the same. I remember the kids at Blockbuster, two years before my favorite store’s demise, asking me not less than three times every time I was at the checkout to sign up for their online services. One day, I finally got annoyed and asked “you DO realize that your trying to sell away your own job, right?”. He replied “oh no, Blockbuster just wants you to have the option of finding other movies that we don’t carry. “Uh uh.
Another anecdote... At least our area restaurants are still really packed on the weekends...for now... B-HO’s carnage has still yet to be seen as it’s masked by social support.
One thing that isn’t mentioned in relation to the death of America’s middle class is the impact the male unemployment rate is playing. When it became acceptable to discriminate against white/Asian men in college admissions (and hiring/promoting), the women who took many of those jobs have also foregone children (for a variety of reasons, whether by their choice or the prospective mates’ choices); the American middle class is literally dying out as no successive generation is born (though we have imported some foreign replacements). What use does the average American have for so many things that were staples in our youth, such as diapers, children’s clothing, toys, etc.?
As long as these demographic trends continue, one needs look no further than the Xanadu mall here in northern NJ to see the future of retail: A massive mall, completed years ago (complete with indoor ski slope), that never opened, while in its shadow every Saturday at the Meadowlands Flea Market Americans sell their household goods and tools of their former trades to imported replacement Americans who pay strictly with the cash with which they are paid.
From the article (emphasis mine):
But Internet shopping alone does not account for the great retail apocalypse that we are witnessing. In fact, some retail experts estimate that the Internet has accounted for only about 20 percent of the decline that we are seeing. Most of the rest of it can be accounted for by the slow, steady death of the middle class U.S. consumer.