Several trends emerged in 2021 that will be worth watching\nin the new year. Here are four to keep an eye on:<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Holiday Shopping Data\nSignals a Strong U.S. Consumer \u2013 <\/strong>The Thanksgiving holiday and Black Friday are\ngenerally key shopping days for retailers, and 2021 delivered. RetailNext, a\nresearch firm that tracks in-store shoppers, said that foot traffic in stores\nwas up 61% this Black Friday compared to 2020, when many consumers were still\nskittish about the spread of Covid-19. Interestingly, consumer enthusiasm to\nget out and shop meant that online sales fell slightly year-over-year, falling\nfrom $9 billion in 2020 to $8.9 billion this year. Even with more consumers\nvisiting stores in person, Black Friday store shopping was still down about 25%\nfrom 2019 levels, before the pandemic struck. Overall, the National Retail\nFederation expects that U.S. November-December retail sales will jump by\napproximately 10% from a year ago, bringing the total to as much as $850\nbillion or more. Despite all the challenges brought by the pandemic, labor\nshortages, and some inventory issues, consumers have increased spending by\nabout 4.4% on average over the last five years. Inflation remains a concern,\nbut consumers are also benefiting from a strong labor market and higher wages,\nwhich have somewhat offset the effect of higher prices.1<\/sup><\/p>\n\n\n\n ___________________________________________________________________________<\/p>\n\n\n\n Avoid These 8 Financial Mistakes When Planning Your Retirement <\/a><\/strong> ___________________________________________________________________________<\/p>\n\n\n\n Will the Omicron Variant\nHurt the Economy? <\/strong>Readers by now have likely heard of the new Covid-19\nstrain called Omicron, which seems likely to be the source of the next wave of\nglobal infections. Public health uncertainties abound, but a key economic\nquestion is: will this new strain result in another pullback of activity,\nspending, manufacturing, etc.? In our view, the scale of the economic impact is\nlikely to depend on the severity of the strain, and whether or not the vaccines\ncontinue to be effective in avoiding severe illness. It is too early to know,\nbut there is one reason to remain hopeful \u2013 with each new wave of Covid-19, the\neconomic impact has declined. In other words, businesses and governments have\nadjusted to the pandemic in a way that the economy can continue to function even\nas the virus spreads, versus March 2020 when the entire global economy was shut\ndown. Vaccination rates also continue to notch higher, which should hopefully\nreduce overall health risks posed by Omicron.3<\/sup><\/p>\n\n\n\n One Potential Driver\nof the Labor Shortage: More Entrepreneurs \u2013 <\/strong>One headline that appears often\nis that there is a shortage of workers in the U.S. But what we do not hear\noften is that the pandemic has also led to a historic surge of entrepreneurship\nand self-employment. There are now 9.4 million self-employed workers in the\nU.S., according to the Labor Department, which marks a 500,000 increase since\nthe start of the pandemic. Many workers are eschewing service sector jobs to\nset out on their own, as consultants, freelancers, and other types of small\nbusiness owners. In 2021, the share of U.S. workers who are employed by a large\ncompany (more than 1,000 employees) fell for the first time since 2004, while\nthe number of self-employed workers is at its highest level in 11 years.\nChances are the number of self-employed workers will continue rising from here\n\u2013 in September alone, 4.4 million people resigned from jobs, a record.4<\/sup><\/p>\n\n\n\n Another Piece of Good\nNews in the Jobs Market \u2013 <\/strong>For the week ending November 20, the number of\nworkers filing for unemployment benefits (jobless claims) fell to 199,000, the\nlowest level in 52 years. Jobless claims serve as a proxy for layoffs, and it\nmakes sense why they would be so low \u2013 employers that have workers don\u2019t want\nto lose them. In the following week, claims rose slightly to 222,000, which\nalso signals a very tight labor market.5<\/sup><\/p>\n\n\n\n Investors Should Become Familiar with These 8 Retirement Mistakes \u2013<\/strong> While we can\u2019t predict or control the future of the market, it is possible to stay focused on actions that can help guide your future investments. There are common mistakes and habits that we believe can help some investors succeed while others fail. Don\u2019t fall prey to common investing mistakes! Holiday spending expected to jump 10%, new variant’s impact may be muted by vaccines and other measures, jobless claims hit 52-year low.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":7426,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[71,73],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-10024","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-private-client-group","category-steady-investors-week"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/zacksim.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10024","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/zacksim.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/zacksim.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zacksim.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zacksim.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10024"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/zacksim.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10024\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10245,"href":"https:\/\/zacksim.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10024\/revisions\/10245"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zacksim.com\/blog\/wp-json\/"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/zacksim.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10024"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zacksim.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10024"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zacksim.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10024"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
<\/a>
Many investors, especially those who are trying to plan for retirement, may be wondering how to prepare for the future. There is no definite answer. That\u2019s why it is better to prepare for any given financial situation!
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But, how can you do this? We believe there are eight common mistakes that many investors make when planning for retirement. In our guide,\u00a08 Retirement Mistakes to Avoid<\/em>, we outline these mistakes and how you can potentially avoid them.
\u00a0
If you have $500,000 or more to invest and want to learn more, click on the link below to get your free copy:
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<\/a>Learn About the 8 Retirement Mistakes to Avoid!<\/a>2<\/a><\/sup><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n
To help you understand some of these mistakes and how to avoid them, we have created the guide, 8 Retirement Mistakes to Avoid<\/em>.6<\/sup>
In this guide, we provide our thoughts on what we believe are 8 of the biggest retirement mistakes investors should avoid<\/a><\/strong>. <\/a>If you have $500,000 or more to invest and want to learn more, click on the link below:<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"