For a long time we have been seeking a chart that captures the pure essence of America's transition into its "new normal" mutant clone, in which record high stock markets coexist with record high foodstamp usage; in which record public debt amounts coexist with record low interest rates; in which the Fed is responsible for 20% of the US GDP but which is forgiven if it means the second coming of a housing bubble giving people the false hope of another "flip that house" get rich scheme. We believe we have found it.
On the chart below we show the number of US manufacturing workers [5] [5]over the past decade (currently at levels first seen in 1941 [5]) on one axis; and the number of bar and restaurant employees [6]- currently at an all time high - on the other. For those asking, in the past year the US has added 366,700 "food service and drinking places" employees and a whopping... 41,000 manufacturing workers.
And that, in a nutshell is the new America: a nation in which more than ever eat out, in which almost nobody actually produces anything.
[7]
Source: BLS