Gentlemen, we are currently living in an age of dating and sex unlike generation of the past. Sex seems to have lost all of its value and ha...
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Wednesday, 8 May 2013
Opinion - Why Women Can’t Have Unemotional Sex By Preston Waters
Opinion - Why Women Can’t Have Unemotional Sex By Preston Waters:
Actress Afro Candy Produces Nigeria’s First Hard Core Porn Movie
Actress Afro Candy Produces Nigeria’s First Hard Core Porn Movie:
Nollywood actress Judith Opara Mazagwu popularly known as AfroCandy has incurred the wrath of some Nigerians and her fans across the world, ...
4 Reasons Business Owners Are Not Confident About the Economy
Take a closer look at some of the fundamentals underlying the recent positive economic news.
In its monthly "beige book" report, the Federal Reserve recently reported moderate economic growth across the country. This was backed up by gross domestic product numbers, which showed a 2.5 percent annualized growth in the first quarter--a significant improvement from the 0.4 percent annualized growth from the fourth quarter of 2012. The unemployment rate continues to tick down. Personal income and spending both increased, pending home sales reached a three-year high, new residential home sales improved, and home prices are surging. The American auto industry had its best performance in 20 years. Most economic indicators seem to be in the normal range.
But--hold on a minute. A recent report found that U.S. home ownership fell to its lowest level since 1995. Both manufacturing activity in the country and orders for durable goods plunged last month. A Kauffman report revealed that entrepreneurial activity declined last year, and the National Federation of Independent Businesses said last month that small business confidence remains at historically low levels. If that's not bad enough, the University of Michigan said that consumer sentiment fell to a three-month low, and, separately, port traffic in the Los Angeles area decreased in March. Things are so gloomy that more than 12 million Americans actually believe that lizard people are running the country.
So is the economy in good shape--or not?
Why are so many small business owners still not feeling as confident as they did a few years ago? The fact is that most of the business people I speak with are very tentative, still uncertain, and still very concerned about some of the fundamentals underlying the numbers.
Here's four reasons why:
1. A deficit decline is not sustainable.
Since 2009 the country has become accustomed to a trillion-dollar annual deficit. I've been watching, with a growing sense of panic, the U.S. national debt, which is now approaching $17 trillion and is, for the first time in U.S. history, greater than the entire national output. But some are celebrating. That's because many projections now show that, with rising tax receipts and some cuts in government spending, the deficit this year is projected to fall to under $800 billion. And the projected annual deficit is estimated will decrease to as little (as little?) as $600 billion by 2015. This doesn't mean the deficit is under control, and you know it. Back in 2007, the deficit was "only" $161 billion and even that was too high. Remember, this is all adding to the country's national debt. And after 2015, the deficit is projected to increase yet again, soon surpassing a trillion dollars a year as the costs of health care, social security, and other entitlements begin kicking in with a vengeance. The business owners I know aren't buying into the myth that the deficit is coming down. The long-term debt could affect the U.S. economy as it's now doing in parts of Europe: rising interest, cuts in spending, tax increases, exchange rate fluctuations, economic turmoil. A decrease in the deficit is purely a short-term thing. I'm concerned about the long term.
2. The stock market boom does not indicate a strong economy.
No one is complaining about the recent rise in stock prices. The benefits of a strong stock market are enormous for small business: It gives customers confidence to spend, adds to a general feeling of optimism in the market, and sure feels good to see my own investment accounts going up, particularly since I have college tuition bills looming. But many business owners I know have serious doubts about the strength of the stock market. Why? Because with easy money flooding the market from the Fed, interest rates so low, and real estate barely recovering, where else is there to invest but the stock market? It's pretty much the only choice for someone not willing to take an enormous amount of speculative risk. So the money flows to the stock market, and prices go up. Does this mean that the market's growth is truly indicative of a strong economy? Or is it a temporary phenomenon? I'm wary, and trying to limit my exposure.
3. Inflation is not dead.
I have to give credit where credit is due: the Federal Reserve has managed to keep inflation pretty much under control for the past 25 years. This has helped keep U.S. prices competitive, costs under control, and interest rate risk at a reasonable level. But if you dig into this, like I did, you get concerned. As shown here, the Fed's balance sheet has literally exploded over the past few years because of the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP) and bond purchases. These initiatives were done with good reason--to provide liquidity to struggling markets. But what if the economy grows more than expected? What if the demand for new loans substantially increases, and excess reserves are drawn down by banks eager to fill the needs of their customers at a rate that's faster than the Fed can control? What if the Fed's exit strategy isn't effective? It's a very high risk game and, if mistakes are made, inflation, followed by high interest rates, could very well happen. Inflation is not dead. It's a dangerous animal that is, for now, kept in its cage. I'd bet you're watching and hoping that this cage holds like I am.
4. Corporations don't have as much cash as it seems.
There's no doubt that companies have a lot of cash on hand. In fact, recent numbers show that non-financial companies have about $2.3 trillion in their bank accounts, a historical high. But this number is misleading. As financial analyst James Bianco explained in this great column: "Liquid assets held on companies' balance sheets is a nominal number, much like the nominal level of GDP, that rarely decreases. Of course cash on the sidelines is at a record nominal level; it usually is. This series must be compared to other balance sheet items for relevance." He uses a chart to explain it: In 1952, 40 percent of companies' total assets were "liquid assets" (cash), and that number is down to only 15 percent today. "It is not as though companies currently have 40 percent of their assets in the form of cash waiting to be invested, as was the case in the 1950s," says Bianco. If investment opportunities become more "enticing," and companies see a potential to make a profit, these levels will drop to the 30-year historical norm of 10 percent or 11 percent.
These are concerns. But no reason to panic. There are always concerns. And one great thing about being a business owner is that you're a glass-is-half-full person. The country is at the very beginning cusp of an energy boom, has tremendous technological resources, a market full of skilled people, and a free economy that is enjoying low interest and low inflation. Of course there are challenges, but no matter how much I complain, there is not a single business owner I speak to who would prefer to be living, raising her children, and doing business anywhere else but in the United States. And that speaks for itself.
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How 3 Kickstarter Projects Beat the Odds
Fashion start-ups have a lousy track record on Kickstarter--the vast majority never reach their goals. Here are three instructive exceptions.
Of the 40,000 successful Kickstarter campaigns hosted on the crowdfunding platform since it came onto the scene in 2009, fashion campaigns are the least successful--only 28 percent of them meet their funding goals.
But in recent months a few breakaway campaigns in this space are worth noting for the lesson they offer any consumer product company seeking to win hearts and pocketbooks. Each company is founded on noble principles that you might think would be the key to their marketing strategies. But ultimately each says there's primarily one thing responsible for their Kickstarter fame: a high-quality product.
Piola
This two-year-old shoe company recently managed to raise more than $85,000, something most companies--in any category--struggle to do.
The idea: Use the Peruvian rainforest's natural resources to create a sustainable business, pay rubber producers fair prices, and wrap it all up in an avant-garde product fashioned by chic Parisian designers.
"We set up an economic development project with US-AID to establish fair trade prices for the rubber and to ensure that our producers got paid a fair wage," says co-founder Joshua Rudd. "The World Wildlife Fund was the team who trained them on how to cut the trees properly and in an environmentally-friendly way without killing the tree," Rudd says.
Not only does Piola now source its materials from 33 wild rubber producers and 55 organic cotton producers in Peru, but also pays them three to five times the market price for these materials.
You can see the appeal here. Not only can you tromp around in cool-looking French shoes, you also get the nice feeling that comes from supporting a company that treats workers fairly and tries to preserve the rainforest.
The 10-Year Hoodie
Flint and Tinder founder Jake Bronstein has a problem with "planned obsolescence," a tactic manufacturers use in which their goods wear out or become unusable sooner rather than later. As a result, consumers buy products more frequently.
His solution? A high-quality, American-made hoodie guaranteed to last at least a decade. If it doesn't, you can send it to Flint and Tinder for mending and the company will mail it back to you for free.
"These days when you walk into a store it almost seems like companies have lowered your expectations so far to the point where, yeah, you can buy something really cheap and that's nice, but when it falls apart on you or when it isn't what you wanted or when it comes apart at the seams quickly, you almost know better than to take it back," he says. "You assume that there's something written on the back of the receipt that says that you got what you paid for and you're not entitled to anything else."
It wasn't always this way, Bronstein says. Background props in his Kickstarter video include things like an old metal fan, a rotary phone, and a hand-crank pencil sharpener--all nostalgic triggers that elicit the idea that "they don't make 'em the way they used to." You'll also see a strategically-placed flag behind him as he speaks--a reminder that the hoodie is made in America, something Bronstein says is important to his customers.
"When my dad was young, you could take anything back to a department store. They had a reputation and valued the relationship that they had with you and they really only wanted to sell something that they felt was going to live up to the promise of both the product and the company selling it and so we kind of wanted to revisit that idea," he says.
It's a compelling concept. The 10-Year Hoodie is the most successful fashion campaign ever conducted on Kickstarter--it recently exceeded its $50,000 goal by $1 million.
Gustin
Jeans makers Josh Gustin and Stephen Powell, co-founders of San-Francisco-based Gustin, did something quite different with their Kickstarter campaign. The six-year-old company offered fans the chance to change the way they buy jeans. Instead of paying as much as $205 for their high-quality American-made jeans typically sold in swanky boutiques, Gustin asked them if they'd rather buy them online in a Kickstarter-like platform of their own.
In other words, after more than 4,000 backers pledged nearly $450,000 through Kickstarter to buy its jeans, which start at $81, Gustin promised to let them keep doing it going forward. Now if you visit weargustin.com you can pledge to buy a certain pair of jeans, but Gustin won't actually start cutting and sewing material until enough backers have committed to buy a particular style. In that way, customers are actually deciding which styles get produced--a pretty genius way to get full transparency into what buyers want most.
"For us, the whole brand is about authenticity," says Gustin. "I think we're changing the way typical fashion brands engage with consumers. Fashion is typically very standoffish--creative geniuses that you'll never understand or talk to and they're just brilliant. We like how we design and our products are great but we don't need to keep our consumers at arm's length," says Gustin.
The Common Denominator: An Exceptional Product
Fair trade, preserving the rainforest, made in America, a tight relationship with customers--these are all compelling reasons to buy products like Piola shoes, Flint and Tinder hoodies, and Gustin jeans. Even so, each company says these underlying principles come as bonuses and are not the primary draw to their products.
For example, when asked if the idea of helping people in Peru and protecting the rainforest are Piola's main virtues, Rudd said, "It hasn't really affected our customers to the point where they will go out of their way to spend the extra dollar. The fashion obviously drives the market first. If they like the aesthetic of the shoe, the customer is going to buy it. A lot of the time they won't even know the story behind Piola and what we're doing until they research us."
Bronstein sings a similar tune when it comes to his long-lived sweatshirt and the draw of "made in America."
"We made the absolute best product that we could," he says. "If you ask people to buy something because of where it was made that's almost like charity, it's not really sustainable. They have to love it, and then where it was made or how it was made is a secondary plus."
As for those crowdsourced jeans, Gustin shares the insistence on creating first a beautiful or superior product. "We're trying to do super classic, super high-quality clothing," Powell says.
Want to see examples of other Kickstarter campaigns that soared past their funding goals? Check out 9 Insanely Successful Kickstarter Campaigns, which highlights companies that are nailing both form and function.
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US President Obama Threatens Daughters About Getting A “Family
US President Obama Threatens Daughters About Getting A “Family:
Prior to the Boston Marathon Bombings, President Obama spoke on NBC’s “Today” show about what he would do if his daughters ever wanted to ge...
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