The GFC, you should see it over here.

[monotonehell]

All you guys complaining because a few buildings are on hold in Adelaide should come and look at it from the US's perspective.

There's existing malls half vacated, because tenants have gone out of business. A new mall across from Disneyland (Garden Walk) has only been able to attract tenants to about a third of its floorspace. Today I've visited various strip, indoor and outdoor malls (about 7 in all) in about 5 different suburbs and the only one doing well is owned by Westfield (!)
I've seen two abandoned ToysRus locations on busy boulevards and many many abandoned building sites.

The money taps were turned off for construction, heaps of people are out of work. It's really bitten here.

I think we've gotten off lightly during this economic event.


Even Disneyland is feeling the pinch, they've laid off a load of their entertainment cast members, rationalised their food services, and put their Annual Passes on a pay by the month scheme for SoCal locals.

[Queen Anne]

There's existing malls half vacated, because tenants have gone out of business. A new mall across from Disneyland (Garden Walk) has only been able to attract tenants to about a third of its floorspace. Today I've visited various strip, indoor and outdoor malls (about 7 in all) in about 5 different suburbs and the only one doing well is owned by Westfield (!)
I've seen two abandoned ToysRus locations on busy boulevards and many many abandoned building sites.



I think we've gotten off lightly during this economic event.

It's ridiculous the amount of shopping places they have here. I wonder if Australia got out of the GFC lightly because we didn't go as completely barmy on the good times as they have clearly gone here. I struggle to understand how they could have thought this level of retail gluttony would be sustainable.

I think it's all very sad - out of control sprawl, too many places dominated by box stores, strip malls and power centres and looking almost exactly the same as each other, not to mention severely diminished shopping choices. How could this be allowed to happen? And the thing that really worries me is that even with the GFC I don't hear much talk that retail here in the US needs rethinking. I guess it's easier to ignore this elephant in the room and hope that stuff like "cash for clunkers" and stimulous spending will restart the US economy, so we can all get back to our thoughtless/brainwashed spending habits -even though the evidence is all around us right now that it's not sustainable. I would so hate to see Australia go much further down the road of parroting the US style of retail

Hope you are having a good holiday despite the gloomier than usual atmosphere at DL, Mono.

[chrism4549]

There's existing malls half vacated, because tenants have gone out of business. A new mall across from Disneyland (Garden Walk) has only been able to attract tenants to about a third of its floorspace. Today I've visited various strip, indoor and outdoor malls (about 7 in all) in about 5 different suburbs and the only one doing well is owned by Westfield (!)
I've seen two abandoned ToysRus locations on busy boulevards and many many abandoned building sites.



I think we've gotten off lightly during this economic event.

It's ridiculous the amount of shopping places they have here. I wonder if Australia got out of the GFC lightly because we didn't go as completely barmy on the good times as they have clearly gone here. I struggle to understand how they could have thought this level of retail gluttony would be sustainable.

I think it's all very sad - out of control sprawl, too many places dominated by box stores, strip malls and power centres and looking almost exactly the same as each other, not to mention severely diminished shopping choices. How could this be allowed to happen? And the thing that really worries me is that even with the GFC I don't hear much talk that retail here in the US needs rethinking. I guess it's easier to ignore this elephant in the room and hope that stuff like "cash for clunkers" and stimulous spending will restart the US economy, so we can all get back to our thoughtless/brainwashed spending habits -even though the evidence is all around us right now that it's not sustainable. I would so hate to see Australia go much further down the road of parroting the US style of retail

Hope you are having a good holiday despite the gloomier than usual atmosphere at DL, Mono.

If the gov't controls or limits anything it's "socialism" and taking away our rights. Dear Leader Obama and the Black Panthers taking over and subverting the white man and so forth. You've been living here for a while, you know. Nobody will change anything because all the money is getting funneled in by lobbyists to politicians. I'm starting to believe our best days are behind us, I'm afraid. It's time to move on.

[Omicron]

If the gov't controls or limits anything it's "socialism" and taking away our rights. Dear Leader Obama and the Black Panthers taking over and subverting the white man and so forth. You've been living here for a while, you know. Nobody will change anything because all the money is getting funneled in by lobbyists to politicians. I'm starting to believe our best days are behind us, I'm afraid. It's time to move on.

The US political system and its current situation really are fascinating.

Incidentally, Their Royal Highnesses George and Anne (or is it Anne and George? ) aren't quite at the Rush Limbaugh stage, but they'll be there soon enough.

:p

[AtD]

They would have been better off if they stayed part of the British Empire.

[Queen Anne]

Incidentally, Their Royal Highnesses George and Anne (or is it Anne and George? ) aren't quite at the Rush Limbaugh stage, but they'll be there soon enough.

:p

Rush Limbaugh?? Will I find him on NPR? lol

And, but of course, it is Anne and George.

[Queen Anne]

Nobody will change anything because all the money is getting funneled in by lobbyists to politicians. I'm starting to believe our best days are behind us, I'm afraid. It's time to move on.

I'm no expert on these issues so please forgive if this is a silly question, but regarding the way America shops - where is the voice of manufacturing in this issue? American manufacturing seems to be very, very weak. It seems to me the box stores sell, almost exclusively, cheaply made foreign products. The consumer driven economy should make some room for the rebirth of a manufacturing economy maybe? Why do we not hear too much about this (beyond the car industry), I wonder? And what about agricultural production? More and more food seems to be coming from OS. I even had to search labels for "product of USA" hamburger pickles the other week. What could be more American than that product? As an honorary American, these things really bother me. It also bothers me that Australia has similar issues.

[chrism4549]

Nobody will change anything because all the money is getting funneled in by lobbyists to politicians. I'm starting to believe our best days are behind us, I'm afraid. It's time to move on.

I'm no expert on these issues so please forgive if this is a silly question, but regarding the way America shops - where is the voice of manufacturing in this issue? American manufacturing seems to be very, very weak. It seems to me the box stores sell, almost exclusively, cheaply made foreign products. The consumer driven economy should make some room for the rebirth of a manufacturing economy maybe? Why do we not hear too much about this (beyond the car industry), I wonder? And what about agricultural production? More and more food seems to be coming from OS. I even had to search labels for "product of USA" hamburger pickles the other week. What could be more American than that product? As an honorary American, these things really bother me. It also bothers me that Australia has similar issues.

We do have some manufacturing but it's a fairly small percentage of our overall GDP ("Industry" is about 20%). Per Wikipedia:

USA is the leading manufacturer in the world with a 2007 industrial output of US$2,696,880 millions. Main industries are petroleum, steel, motor vehicles, aerospace, telecommunications, chemicals, electronics, food processing, consumer goods, lumber, mining.

Where you are in Seattle you might see some of that out in Washington state in terms of lumber and in Seattle proper in terms of telecom. Agriculture is about 1% of our economy and most of that is coporate farming. We actually export a lot of that. It just might seem like there's a lot of foreign stuff depending on seasonality and variety that you will find in stores. No one's going to settle for just one or two kinds of anything or not having something in stock. So they'll have to figure out how to get something from somwhere if they want to stay in business and it better be really good or really cheap.

Our economy is really built on the services industry. A lot of that is based around banking, IT, healthcare, and retail. Basically, if you have specialized skills here, you can do pretty well and you were making the economy zip along in the past. With globalization, some view that (and with our ability to innovate and be entrepreneurial) as sort of our 'core competency'.

There's two kinds of people. Ones that want really cool, high end stuff and the other that just wants really cheap stuff. All these other countries were just able to make it and put it in the stores and people bought it. We just love to have more stuff. If my neighbor bought a Lexus, I bought a BMW. If my sister bought a 3,000 sq ft house, I bought a 3,500 sq. ft house (that's 325 square meters, to you). And I'm an Associate VP at a bank, I wouldn't be caught dead going out with out some nice name brands like Ralph Lauren or Tommy Hilfiger. If you wanted to keep up and be part of the club you bought a house you could barely afford and if you wanted stay in business (or try to get in on the business) you got some cheap funding with a lackluster business model. Politicians didn't care because it was all going good and they could focus on important stuff like gays getting married. There were people saying it wasn't sustainable but no one wanted to hear it or do what was required to make any sort of changes.

There's a couple of houses that have been for sale in my neighborhood for about a year. There's a lot of good real estate (lots and so forth) right near down town just sitting there...I wish I could come up with some cash to do some long term development. This would be a great time to scoop up land in the right spots. Despite what they say, cash is still hard to come by from the banks.

[Queen Anne]

That was interesting chris, thank you for taking the time

Agriculture is about 1% of our economy and most of that is coporate farming. We actually export a lot of that. It just might seem like there's a lot of foreign stuff depending on seasonality and variety that you will find in stores. No one's going to settle for just one or two kinds of anything or not having something in stock. So they'll have to figure out how to get something from somwhere if they want to stay in business and it better be really good or really cheap.

I hadn't thought about seasonality issues, and what you say makes sense. But I cautiously tend to think it's not the whole story as to why I am finding a growing presence of imported "everyday" type foods at the supermarket. I saw this interesting statistic in an article on food safety:

http://news.healingwell.com/index.php?p=news1&id=611280
"And there's more imported food in the nation's supermarkets than ever before. According to the CDC (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention), food imports to the United States have almost doubled in the past decade, from $36 billion in 1997 to more than $70 billion in 2007."

On another note, the house next door to us has also been for sale for at least a year. Here's hoping things improve soon for the US, and also that this "teachable moment" (to take a line from President Obama) is not wasted.

[monotonehell]

Here's a funny observation.

Last time I was Stateside, the advertising on the TV drove me crazy. It was SO obnoxious. Now it's almost the same as TV ads back home.

Life over here isn't that much different from back home. Some attitudes are different, but I fit in here and don't feel like the proverbial fish at all.

If you can crack the code on how to tip in a bar, then you got it made.