Market Research
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To help stabilize financial markets, the US Congress established a $700 billion Troubled Asset Relief
Program (TARP) in October 2008. The government used some of these funds to purchase equity in
US banks and other industrial corporations, much of which had been returned to the government by
early 2011. In January 2009 the US Congress passed and President Barack OBAMA signed a bill
providing an additional $787 billion fiscal stimulus to be used over 10 years - two-thirds on
additional spending and one-third on tax cuts - to create jobs and to help the economy recover.
Approximately two-thirds of these funds were injected into the economy by the end of 2010. In
March 2010, President OBAMA signed a health insurance reform bill into law that will extend
coverage to an additional 32 million American citizens by 2016, through private health insurance for
the general population and Medicaid for the impoverished. In July 2010, the president signed the
DODD-FRANK Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act, a bill designed to promote financial
stability by protecting consumers from financial abuses, ending taxpayer bailouts of financial firms,
dealing with troubled banks that are "too big to fail," and improving accountability and transparency
in the financial system - in particular, by requiring certain financial derivatives to be traded in
markets that are subject to government regulation and oversight. In late 2010, the US Federal
Reserve Bank (The Fed) announced that it would purchase $600 billion worth of US Government
bonds by June 2011, in an attempt to keep interest rates from rising and snuffing out the nascent
recovery.
Food Consumption in USA
Americans at the beginning of the 21st century are
consuming more food and several hundred more calories
per person per day than did their counterparts in the late
1950s (when per capita calorie consumption was at the
lowest level in the last century), or even in the 1970s.
The aggregate food supply in 2000 provided 3,800
calories per person per day, 500 calories above the 1970
level and 800 calories above the record low in 1957 and
1958.
Now more than ever, America is a Nation of meat eaters.
In 2000, total meat consumption (red meat, poultry, and
fish) reached 195 pounds (boneless, trimmed-weight
equivalent) per person, 57 pounds above average annual
consumption in the 1950s. Each American consumed an
average of 7 pounds more red meat than in the 1950s, 46
pounds more poultry, and 4 pounds more fish and
shellfish. Rising consumer incomes, especially with the
increase in two-income households, and meat prices in the 1990s that were often at 50-year lows,
when adjusted for inflation, explain much of the increase in meat consumption. In addition, the
meat industry has provided scores of new brand-name, value-added products processed for
consumers’ convenience, as well as a host of products for foodservice operators.
