Ecommerce sales were granted tax free status to promote the growth of the medium in hopes of fomenting the economic stimulus that has subsequently occurred. But that was almost a generation ago. Ancient history by today's standards of time.
The problem is that retail sales are growing, but retail jobs, frequently the entry level, safety-net employment for many nascent or rebounding economies are not keeping pace. As the article below, asks in part, has everything become Amazon's show room, as displayed on Apple's made-in-China devices?
Retail employment has been declining since the 1980s, not coincidentally, around the time that the advantage garnered by the US in WWII began to recede. But that decline was subsequently hastened by the emergence of industrial strength ecommerce.
The question, from both a public policy and business strategy standpoint is what, if anything, can or should be done about it. We know that the benefits of technology adoption cycles can take 40 years or more to be fully realized by all members of society. And we understand that the internet has, on balance, provided massive added value, much of which we have yet to completely comprehend. But we also know that in the interim through which we are currently living, many are being penalized by these advances even as some prosper. In the past, society might have found a way to cushion the blow for those who needed it, while continuing to encourage the causal growth in hopes of reaping rewards on either end. For the moment, the penchant for public austerity has eliminated that option. Which may mean that feelings of resentment on both sides lead instead to a suboptimal conclusion for all. JL
Joe Weisenthal reports in Business Insider:
That headline isn't quite as hyperbolic as you might think. People are puzzling over the fact that retail sales and spending continue to be quite strong, and yet retail employment is diving.
In the last two jobs reports (the first of which was quite strong) retail shed a serious amount of jobs in both. It's temping to say this is seasonable giveback, but really, Christmas happens every year
That's the beauty of seasonality. What's more, if this were just a matter of the BLS not adjusting for seasonality well, then you'd expect to see the same distortions every year around this time, but they're really not that severe.
New Deal Democrat at The Bonddad Blog summarizes the latest week of data like this: "With the sole exception of the decline in rail traffic, due to utilities needing less coal for energy generation in turn due to the unusual weather, none of the high frequency indicators are giving any warning of any imminent turn in the economy. The Oil choke collar remains engaged, but generally the data suggests smooth sailing ahead. More than anything else, the comparatively poor jobs report strongly indicates something is going on with retail stores. Is everybody becoming Amazon's showroom?"
And there is some non-theoretical evidence of this. Best Buy is closing scads of stores thanks to Apple and Amazon decimating its business.
All that being said, the decline in retail employment as a share of total employment has been trending down since the late 80s
And one last point: Check out what's going on with food services/drinking places employment. It's still booming month after month. If this were about weak end demand, rather than something else, you wouldn't see this much hiring in an area that's quite discretionary to most consumers
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