Mr. HEIRT NOELT (Belgian Asset Manager): Exports have been the main engine of growth in Europe, where as consumption and credit growth have been the main engine of economic growth in the United States.
As unemployment is still high in the U.S., the primary method of financing new consumption is through credit cards.
SHANGHAI China has been supporting property purchases by certain buyers to meet genuine rather than speculative demand in the past few months, as Beijing seeks ways to stimulate consumption and ease credit to stave off a hard landing for the world's second-largest economy.
By last weekend, we were even with year-ago rates of credit card consumption.
An accommodative monetary policy would involve keeping the fed funds rate (the short-term rate at which banks lend to each other) at historic lows so as to encourage consumption and provide cheaper credit to consumers and businesses.
Russia has achieved this success not by coddling its job creators or by adopting radically free-market and business-friendly policies, but by supporting consumer demand, encouraging consumption, and loosening credit within the confines of its (deeply flawed) preexisting economic structures.
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Both sides desire capital consumption over the very saving that provides credit to the businesses that would otherwise move the economy forward.
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Any rise in home prices could still increase consumption, even if it does so by removing credit constraints rather than through the wealth effect.
"Growth in household loans slowed notably from the previous quarter, while sales on credit saw a big fall amid sluggish consumption, " the bank said in a statement.
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Changes in consumption habits are evident in the exploding use of consumer credit cards.
Keynesians advocate increased government spending and inflationary credit expansion to make up for shortfalls in consumption and investment spending.
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These are big ticket items that are sensitive to credit conditions and indicative of both business activity and consumption.
The report, the Economic Survey of Latin America and the Caribbean, identified private consumption as "the main driver of regional growth, thanks to the growth in labour markets, increased credit and - in some cases - remittances".
Rachel Botsman, a leading researcher on collaborative consumption, argues that we will soon enter an era when our online reputation will become more important than our credit score.
Governments have shown they can support consumption in specific areas, such as the cash-for-clunkers subsidy in cars or the homebuyers' tax credit.
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