I arrived in Phoenix on Sunday, and when walking down the escalator at the airport I noticed a sign that the escalator rails were being disinfected by UVC. I thought this was a good omen for the NALMCO convention.
At the show, there is lots of discussion on EV chargers. In our SEP/OCT issue of LM&M, we featured EV chargers on the front cover of the magazine as it was one of the main stories.
Across from the hotel is some sort of open air shopping center and there must be dozens, if not hundreds, of complimentary EV chargers. Your humble editor saw Charge Point and Volta chargers—hopefully installed by a NALMCO member. I drive a Hybrid and have some experience with the technology.
I think of the entire purpose of EVs is to save energy and improve the environment, but I noticed the Volta Charging units have two huge video screens with one charger per screen. There were no cars being charged at the time, but the screens were blaring video on what was a bright sunny day. As I approached the chargers, I could feel the air from large fans blowing to cool the electronics. There is a certain irony about the amount of energy being wasted to save energy.
President Scott Mendelsohn kicked off the show and welcomed Dr. Chris Kuehl of Armada Corporate Intelligence as the keynote. Dr. Kuehl is an economist and one of the best keynote speakers I have heard. Basically, he does not think we are going into a recession, but if we do it will be short and shallow. Here are his highlights and predictions:
- Expect oil at the $70 to $80 barrel range in 2023. The U.S. is the largest oil producer in the world, but we only produce about 13M barrels per day while consuming about 20M per day.
- The slower growth is due to the boom we had in 2021. Record setting 6% growth in Q2 2021. He said we were near 9% in Q3 2021 and thinks we will see a little bit of growth in Q3 2022, but negative in Q4 and Q1 2023. In the remainder of 2023, we should be at normal growth of 2.5%
- Halloween is the 2nd largest consumer spending holiday in the US and adults now outspend kids when it comes to costumes. So far, we are seeing a strong Halloween.
- Employment is still strong and consumers who earn more than $50,000 annually are still spending. Those earning less have slowed spending. Infrastructure cash is starting to make its way into the system and there is a lot of it.
- There are reasons to worry as GDP is slowing globally and high inflation will continue to drive banks to hike rates.
- Although consumers (incomes above $50,000) are spending today, they are expecting a recession which may be self-fulfilling.
- Kuehl worked in Russia and knows of their corruption first-hand. He spoke of one Russian bureaucrat who laminated his bribery rates, saying, “It just makes negotiations more efficient.” He cited fuel trucks that were sent to Ukraine to fuel Russian tanks, many instead sold the fuel to Ukrainians.
Next on the agenda is the round-robin networking event.