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Happy 4th of July (and Some Statistics)

Written by Nickel - 7 Comments

Well, I’m back in town after just under 2500 miles of driving on my way to and from a much needed vacation. In honor of Independence Day, I thought I’d post some interesting 4th of July food, finance and trade statistics that I just ran across… For starters, Americans are 540% more likely to consume potato salad today than on a ‘typical’ day. What about other traditionally American foods?

Baked beans: 357% more likely.
Hot dogs: 210%.
Ice cream sodas and floats: 200%.
Pickles: 167%.
Cole slaw: 150%.
Macaroni and other pasta salads: 150%.
Hamburgers: 117%.

Conveniently, staples such as ground beef, potatoes, mayonnaise, and ice cream have all dropped in price since last year, although soft drinks have gone up slightly (or at least that’s what the article claims).

What about all that beer? July is, after all, American Beer Month. The Brewers’ Association reports that Americans consume 40% more beer in July than during the average month during the balance of the year. Beer prices, which have climbed a bit of 4% since last July, stand at an average of $0.82 for 12 ounces. For those of you that like to compare things to the price of gas, that works out to $8.72/gallon. Next time you feel like cursing the gas pump, just be thankful that your car doesn’t run on beer!

And what about the 4th of July trade deficit? Well, the US imported $172.5M worth of fireworks from China last year while only exporting $17.3M worth. Similarly, the US imported $5.2M worth of American flags (once again, mostly from China) while shipping on $851,000 worth of American flags overseas.

Happy 4th of July!

[Source: CNN/Money]

Published on July 4th, 2005 - 7 Comments
Filed under: Miscellany

About the author: Nickel is the founder and editor-in-chief of this site. He's a thirty-something family man who has been writing about personal finance since 2005, and guess what? He's on Twitter!

7 Responses to “Happy 4th of July (and Some Statistics)”

1
JLP Says:
July 4th, 2005 at 2:24 pm
Nickel,

I find it hard to believe that ice cream has dropped in price since last year. Anyway, Happy 4th.
2
nickel Says:
July 4th, 2005 at 2:39 pm
As I recall, milk prices were sky high awhile back and have moderated somewhat since that time. Perhaps something similar has happened with ice cream.
3
Todd Derscheid Says:
July 4th, 2005 at 3:31 pm
Mainstream horrible beer prices are down.

I wish our cars DID run on beer instead of gas. More Americans make their own beer than make their own ethanol or bio-diesel already.
4
nickel Says:
July 4th, 2005 at 4:50 pm
To be fair, the article that you linked doesn’t say what they’re comparing the lower prices against. Perhaps they’re lower relative to the holidays, but not lower as compared to a year ago (e.g., was there a fall runup in prices followed by recent price cutting?). But your point about bad beer struggling and recent price cuts is well taken. With regard to the second point about brewing your own beer vs. at-home biodiesel production, how many people are setup to produce enough beer to fill a gas tank even infrequently?
5
FMF Says:
July 5th, 2005 at 10:30 am
Regarding ice cream, prices are down overall due to lots of promotional activity this year. Something’s always on deal! (of course, Moose Tracks is best and is worth buying whether on deal or not!)
6
nickel Says:
July 5th, 2005 at 10:49 am
I should’ve known that we’d be hearing from the ice cream expert himself!
7
Matt Says:
July 7th, 2005 at 6:22 am
Gas or beer is fine…just as long as cars don’t run on inkjet printer ink. (Filling a typical gas tank with that stuff would cost over $100,000.)

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