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| Alex Doherty

Popular Travel Destinations Poised for Continued Growth

Commercial air travel across the nation has increased by over 124 million passengers from 2012 through 2017, but some regions are benefitting more than others. The Los Angeles and New York City metro areas have each seen over 11 million more passengers board planes at their airports over the past five years. Following close behind, the Chicago, Dallas, San Francisco, Seattle, and Miami markets have also added more than 5 million air passengers from 2012 through 2017. The following map highlights these changes, with labels for all metro areas that gained over 2.5 million additional airplane passengers.

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| Alex Doherty

More Trouble Ahead for Dairy Farmers?

June is national dairy month, but not all dairy farmers are milking it up. Dairy farms in the nation have declined every year over the past decade from 59,130 in 2007 to 40,219 in 2017 according to the USDA, and reports of struggling dairy farmers are more and more prevalent. Just over half of all dairy farms are in the Midwest, and these states have been hit the hardest over the past decade, suffering a 34.5% decline from 32,245 farms to 21,120 farms.

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| Alex Doherty

Sweet Halloween Savings

As Halloween approaches, U.S. consumers are seeing some savings as they purchase candy for October 31st. The Consumer Price Index (CPI) measures the changing cost of goods and services over time. While the CPI for all goods is commonly known as a measure of inflation, we can use subsets of CPI data to track the price changes of specific goods, such as candy and chewing gum. The price of candy this time of year is the lowest it’s been since 2014. If consumers spend the same amount on candy as the past two years, this may translate to more sweets for trick-or-treaters!

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| Alex Doherty

Prime Expansion Locations for Automobile Manufacturers

Over the past five years, transportation equipment manufacturers have experienced some of the fastest employment growth within the manufacturing sector. Employment for these manufacturers in the United States grew an annual average 2.6% over the five years ending with the second quarter of 2017 compared with an annual average 1.7% for the total manufacturing sector. Within transportation equipment, employment grew the fastest for manufacturers that produced motor vehicles (+4.8%), motor vehicle bodies and trailers (+4.8%), and motor vehicle parts (+4.7%).