Re: Spinning Black Friday Retail Sales

[David Farber <dave () farber net>]

Begin forwarded message:

From: Esther Dyson <edyson () edventure com>
Date: December 3, 2008 7:57:36 AM EST
To: dave () farber net, "ip" <ip () v2 listbox com>
Subject: Re: [IP] Re:   Spinning Black Friday Retail Sales

Yes, but if those inflation numbers include the price of gas (which is  
rarely bought online!), then the bias may be overstated as well.  In  
other words, always look your holiday gift horses in the mouth!  and  
don't jump to conclusions.

Esther

At 02:19 PM 12/2/2008, David Farber wrote:


> Begin forwarded message:
>
> From: Tobin Maginnis <ptm () pix cs olemiss edu>
> Date: December 2, 2008 10:05:47 AM EST
> To: dave () farber net
> Subject: Re: [IP] Spinning Black Friday Retail Sales
>
> Dave,
>
> Barry did not take inflation into consideration which more than
> accounts for the difference! Using the 1980 BLS method, inflation for
> the last year has averaged more than 11%! Therefore sales figures are
> actually down 11%-7% or 4%!
>
>
> From: http://www.shadowstats.com/alternate_data/download_cpi?mode=text
>                CPI-U           SGS-Alt
>                Index   CPI-U   CPI-Equiv       SGS-Alt
> Year    Month   1982/4=100      Yr/Yr % Index   Yr/Yr %
> 2007    Oct     208.9   3.54%   551.9   11.07%
> 2007    Nov     210.2   4.31%   556.3   11.75%
> 2007    Dec     210.0   4.08%   564.5   11.73%
> 2008    Jan     211.1   4.28%   572.2   11.80%
> 2008    Feb     211.7   4.03%   582.4   11.56%
> 2008    Mar     213.5   3.98%   589.3   11.58%
> 2008    Apr     214.8   3.94%   593.5   11.53%
> 2008    May     216.6   4.18%   599.6   11.82%
> 2008    Jun     218.8   5.02%   612.3   12.59%
> 2008    Jul     220.0   5.60%   617.8   13.36%
> 2008    Aug     219.1   5.37%   617.5   13.22%
> 2008    Sep     218.8   4.94%   619.0   12.86%
> 2008    Oct     216.6   3.66%   616.1   11.63%
>
>
> David Farber wrote:
> > Begin forwarded message:
> > From: dewayne () warpspeed com (Dewayne Hendricks)
> > Date: December 1, 2008 11:18:20 PM EST
> > To: Dewayne-Net Technology List <xyzzy () warpspeed com>
> > Subject: [Dewayne-Net] Spinning Black Friday Retail Sales
> > Spinning Black Friday Retail Sales
> > Posted By Barry Ritholtz On December 1, 2008 @ 7:11 am
> > <http://www.ritholtz.com/blog/2008/12/spinning-black-friday-retail-sales/  
> > >
> > A few things you can count on every year around this time:
> >   • Sales data for Black Friday will be touted by biased interest
> > groups. They are invariably have an upside bias;
> >   • Headline writers will get it wrong
> >   • Survey data will be taken as the equivalent of actual sales;
> >   • Strong forecasts will be subsequently proven wrong;
> > Such is the current situation with the Black Friday sales data, with
> > reports still trickling in from around the country.
> > The WSJ goes for a hat trick of errors, starting with this article’s
> > headline:
> > • [1] Holiday Shopping Off to Strong Start
> > What’s wrong with this? First, as opposed to actual sales data, they
> > rely on a “survey of 3,370 shoppers, the National Retail Federation
> > estimated shoppers spent an average of $372.57 over the weekend, up
> > 7.2% over last year’s $347.55.” The National Retail Federation is
> > hardly the objective group you want crafting (or hiring 3rd parties
> > to create)  survey questions; 2nd, we know that humans are terrible
> > at forecasting their own behaviors. Historically, their projections
> > have had little correlation with their actual spending patterns. And
> > third, the headline is belied by the details contained in the
> > article. ([2] MarketWatch was no better)
> > [snip]RSS Feed: <http://www.warpspeed.com/wordpress>
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>
>
>
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Esther Dyson              Always make new mistakes!

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