patrick.net

Who's America's biggest Water distributor?

That chart is really misleading. The least affordable cities are also highly sucessful ones with robust economies. Meanwhile the "Most affordable" ones are rust belt cities... well most of them on the list except ATL. The thing is that the houses might be comparatively cheap in Detroit, but the job market sucks so are they actually affordable? Probably not.

So which is it, are we drinking 17 cases of water a year, or 17 cases of Coke?

Two companies dominate the world market for branded bottled water: Groupe Danone, based in Paris, and Nestle, S.A., based in Vaud, Switzerland. The former markets Evian, Volvic, and others, including Dannon spring water. Nestle markets such majors as Perrier, Vittel, San Pellegrino, Poland Spring and Deer Park.

The US subsidiaries of these global giants are jockeying for shelf space with private label, regional and niche products, and with two formidable soft drink giants: Coca-Cola and PepsiCo, marketing their own brands of water.

Just last week, Loyola University in Chicago announced it would stop selling bottled water in cafeterias and on-campus stores this fall, and remove bottled water from vending machines starting in 2013. Loyola joins at least 15 other schools in the U.S. and Canada in banning bottled water sales, including the University of Vermont, Washington University, DePauw University, and Harvard’s School of Public Health.

At least four major municipalities — New York, Seattle, San Francisco, and Chicago’s Cook County — have banned use of government funds to purchase bottled water.

Despite the record amount of water sold — 2011 beat out the previous, pre-recession year of 2007, when volume was 8.8 billion gallons — 2011 was not a record year in dollar sales of bottled water.

At retail, Americans spent $21.7 billion on bottled water in 2011, just under 2007’s spending.

The big three bottled water companies — Coke, Pepsi and Nestlé — have been discounting water heavily in the last few years, to sustain sales through the recession and the growing opposition.

OK everybody stop drinking anything, until the Liberals get to the bottom of what we should all dink and NOT Drink!

Don't drink the soda,
don't drink the soda with artificial sweetener
oh and Don't drink the water...

Don't drink the Kool-Aid comrades.

It seems as though the so called market experts who trade gold don't know what the hell is going on either with the price movements.

Analyzer says

It seems as though the so called market experts who trade gold don't know what the hell is going on either with the price movements.

SFAce was buying GDX in December, easy 25% in two months.

bgamall4 says

Real tears come with a real emotional experience. Liz Taylor was not a method actor, and drew on real emotion from the past. The fact that these bad method actors did not cry a single tear or have a single red eye condemns Sandy Hook to being a total fake. Give it up Bigsby, you are making a fool out of yourself. No tears by all the participants. Obvious method acting in hyperventilation for Carlee and Robbie.

Don't continue to be a dwarf, Bigsby.

Why didn't the folks in charge of Sandy Hook hire better actors then? Crying on cue isn't exactly a difficult skill to acquire--I would think there are thousands of actors out there that could have fit the bill.

In fact, I question whether there are any professional actors that can't cry real tears. That's pretty much a basic skill. A better argument can be made that they can't be actors because all actors can produce real tears when needed.

tr6 says

Analyzer says

It seems as though the so called market experts who trade gold don't know what the hell is going on either with the price movements.

SFAce was buying GDX in December, easy 25% in two months.

And how many picked the opposite trade?

Tim Aurora says

The chart is a stat, so it neither pointing or misleading.

It is because the way its being presented is that here are the most and least affordable cities when in fact a city like Detroit which has lost 60% of its population and is bankrupt simply does not operate on the same economic scale as the rest of the cities on that list. Given that a huge chunk of its population lives in poverty shows that there's not hardly a huge number of people who can afford even the houses there. So is it affordable? Not really. It might even be less affordable than some of the ones at the top of the list ranked as least affordable.

My point is, we'll be bailing out Pepsi and Coke before we know it.

The to big to Gulp act.

bgamall4 says

So, Tatupu, you don't get it. People aren't actors and don't notice most of lthe time unless they are trained to notice. Many Sandy Hook Hoax proponents are trained or are learning like I am. No tears, no red eyes, you can be considered a good actor, but you are not being real.

How many kids died? How many parents are you saying are actors? Remember when I asked you how many family and friends you have? How many family and friends do these people have? How many of those have come forward to say that they are actors playing a role? Do you get the point, and do you get how bloody stupid you are being?

Jesse's hotdogger goes flaming horndogger and winds up in wedding dress at Attica.

Zimbabwe says "machete massacres OK, but no man can have more than 80 wives."

Tim Aurora says

Get this, it is a stat. You can form your opinions based on the stat and you can argue against some of the obvious conclusions that people draw ( just like you initially did regarding Detroit and then went back again and said, "no my initial conclusion was wrong") but this is just a stat.

I didn't say that " My initial conclusion is wrong". with regards to that chart. And yes, its a stat. Duh? And I drew a conclusion.... duh again. So what is your point? I think you also need to go and re-read what I just wrote above, which is that within my reaction to the chart I said " Most" in regards to the cities of either selection in regards to my commentary. If you disagree with what I have made of the stat then fine, who cares. But misquoting or misinterpreting what my response was isn't very helpful.

I don't expect this to happen. Republicans never have & never will allow this type of Socialism & govt. interference in the Free Market.LOL

Tim Aurora says

Like it or not that could be good news for existing housing price.

That depends on what you mean by "good news". To most on this board that means falling prices.

I agree with the conclusion of numbeo website. It seems to me that rather than acknowledge and analyze their results, people try to discredit the researchers and claim that they have america-centric bias. However, some number are not subject to biases, namely cost of living and housing costs.

Only a fool would buy in this market.

"LACK OF BUYERS!!!!"

The Bulls ask,"What the Hell do buyers have to do with home sales?"

tatupu70 says

It is patently obvious--I agree. That's why I'm having so much trouble understanding what you don't get.

Ah, quoting out of context - the last resort of one who has been beaten.

The things YOU EXPLAINED are patently obvious. But the things you explained are not the things I ASKED you to explain.

tatupu70 says

lol--you're kidding, right? So, your contention is that the DJIA only moves in the "upper reaches" but the Nasdaq isn't so constrained?

My contention is that we were discussing the DOW, and you all of a sudden substituted in the NASDAQ. Why?

tatupu70 says

% Gain or Loss in the index. I think you're just trolling at this point, so I'll be done now.

So you don't understand that a percentage has to be OF something? Wow, I am floored. Didn't think I needed to explain this, but 10% of 100 is a different amount than 10% of 1000. If you are talking about a percentage, and you don't know what it is a percentage OF, then you quite simply don't know what you're talking about.

It's not inventory, it's price. The houses on the market are going to sit there until the prices go down.

Oh? No cash buyers for New Houses?

This picture tickled me. Would you buy a condo with that many lockboxes on the property?

Then again, maybe this condo complex simply needs a metal cutter like the other one.

Here in the Northeast, the low inventory means high prices and houses still going under agreement withing days or weeks. I don't know where you all live, but even I feel like I missed the boat and am willing to pay more for less.

I live in the northeast, and our lease ends in june. So we've been shooping both the rental market and the used house market. There's plenty to pick from, but the majority of it is overpriced crap.

I already own one house, but for our current needs, renting a primary residence has been a much better deal ( 1375 per month rent for a house that will hit the market @ 270k)

Agreed. Most is overpriced crap. I should have been more specific...anything worth looking at is closer to 475-600K in MA and things in that range are still going pretty quickly (and even with that, most of the houses still need upgrades). I was looking to pay between 400-450K and am now trying to figure out how to do 550K or more. I can only swing that with a huge down payment (which I have, thankfully) but only in locations with lower taxes. Unfortunately, the towns I am looking at have very high taxes (10K or more for that price range).

Yes, taxes are a bitch. In our current cozy little locale, the landlord is forking over 400 of that 1375 per month over in taxes. They are taking a bath, as they bought the house new in 2007 for 369k,,,,

I'm interested to see how motivated they are to sell. They won't renew our lease for another year, instead saying if they don't sell, were welcome to continue on a month to month basis. If something like that enters the fold, I'm going to demand some sort of compensation in the event that we'd be forced to move with such short notice

tts says

You can be totally mentally and physically fit and still end up poor if your economy is busted.

Economy doesn't look busted to me. Looks like average wage went up 7%. Robert Reich's graph should go into the next edition of "How to Lie with Statistics" if there is a next edition.

http://www.amazon.com/How-Lie-Statistics-Darrell-Huff/dp/0393310728/

First flaw in graph is no labels in the Y-axis.

Second flaw is no information about non-US wages. Non-US wages went up with globalization. So we are missing a bunch of wage growth. I'll bet extremely poor parts or China had percentage gains that blow away the productivity gains. This should be obvious when you are dealing with a small base.

Third flaw is why is he only going back to 1947? Quick search on Google shows many papers about productivity in the 19th century. But including that data might complicate the story he's trying to sell.

Homeboy says

Ah, quoting out of context - the last resort of one who has been beaten.

The things YOU EXPLAINED are patently obvious. But the things you explained are not the things I ASKED you to explain.

OK--at this point I don't even know what your question is. Why don't you try to clearly state it?

Homeboy says

My contention is that we were discussing the DOW, and you all of a sudden substituted in the NASDAQ. Why?

Because it illustrated my point. You didn't answer my question...

Homeboy says

So you don't understand that a percentage has to be OF something? Wow, I am floored. Didn't think I needed to explain this, but 10% of 100 is a different amount than 10% of 1000. If you are talking about a percentage, and you don't know what it is a percentage OF, then you quite simply don't know what you're talking about.

Of course I understand that. And I clearly stated it in my post earlier:

tatupu70 says

You obviously use the entire index value because you are comparing to a set starting point. You want to see the change from that index starting point value.

Like I said--I'm tiring of this. If you really have a question, please ask it and stop with the childish nonsense.

hrhjuliet says

It's not inventory, it's price. The houses on the market are going to sit there until the prices go down.

Easy enough to find out. Go to Redfin and look up the stats for your area of interest. you should find charts showing recent listing and sale prices per sqft. If your neighborhood is like mine you will find sale price / list price > 1 and you will also see crazy priced houses go pending in a week.

good luck.

My views on Bitcoin

http://smaulgld.com/bitcoin-a-mining-disaster-waiting-to-happen/

http://smaulgld.com/the-case-against-bitcoin-a-faith-basedemotion-backed-currency/

It's all about the weather. We never had so much weather in history as in the past three months

"Does this tool belt make me look fat?"

CaptainShuddup says

My point is, we'll be bailing out Pepsi and Coke before we know it.

The to big to Gulp act.

Bush/Republicans bailed out the TBTF.So what's wrong with more Big Govt. Republican private business Socialism. The House of Republicans didn't stop all of their Big Govt. funding to prevent the auto bailout.

Current rally is a sucker's rally.

DUMP it now or regret later.

bgamall4 says

Exactly, they believe the NWO will be taken down but the NWO will incorporate it at the time of their choosing.

so obvious a Trojan horse. Digital currency/cashless society is the goal of NWO-total tracking/total control

The Austrians pretty much side with gold going up do to debasing of the currency.

The reality is that we have deflation and the only way gold goes up in value is inflation.

We are not going to have hyperinflation unless there is an extremely unlikely event.

The thing that makes the most sense to me is what Mish pointed out that the credit market has shrunk from what was 50 trillion to probably I'm guessing half that now.

In addition the dollar is still the most trusted currency (plus reserve currency status) so the dollars that are printed are spread across a big area.

This plus the fact that China is re balancing so the demand for commodities is way down.

Mike Pettis (Chinese Economist) he sees gold going lower by half

Of course this is just what I read...

So far the trend seems to remain in place.

indigenous says

This plus the fact that China is re balancing so the demand for commodities is way down.

China is also offloading US treasuries - watch out ;)