Assorted Links Wednesday

The average American says that $19,800 would be a life changing amount of money.  Let's not forget this when doing BR&E.

The rise and fall of elevator (attendants). Anything that can be automated, will be.  

US birth and fertility rates in 2020 dropped to a record low, CDC says.

Household essentials are about to get even more expensive: Procter & Gamble, Kimberly-Clark, Coca-Cola, and General Mills have all announced that they’re planning to raise prices on many of their products to offset the rising cost of doing business. 💸😩.

More pandemic shortages:

Boba Tea: the popular drink’s main ingredient, tapioca pearls, could soon be in short supply because of delays in unloading cargo ships from asia..

Paint:

There is no point blaming COVID-19, the Gulf Freeze, or any other factor or set of factors. The problem is that U.S. industry, in general, and the paint and coatings industry, specifically, have failed to build resilience into their supply chains, and are now paying the price for their negligence. The United States is now putting an additional $1.9 trillion in new stimulus funds into circulation at a time when many experts feel that we are on cusp of a consumer boom, and this will only exacerbate the situation for the most prepared of all manufacturers and potentially wreak havoc on less-prepared producers of raw materials and finished goods, who have failed to build sufficient resilience into their supply chain philosophies and practices.

Aluminum cans.

Tires, in seven years?

Because of COVID-19, rubber producers were not able to plant new rubber trees as they otherwise would have. Since these trees take seven years to mature and leaf disease and flooding have affected the trees that offer the current rubber supply, the supply is dropping.