For years, rising home prices and home equity loans helped people with stagnant incomes to keep up with record food and energy prices. With the collapse of the real estate market, it was beginning to look like there was nothing to take up the slack. But this morning, CNNMoney reports, Wal-Mart Stores Inc. (NYSE: WMT) customers who received gift cards over the holidays are using them for "food and consumables rather than discretionary purchases."

If that's really true, rather than a convenient excuse for a less-than-perfectly managed retail store experience, then it tells us that the U.S. economy is in a heap of trouble. That's because a consumer who uses gift cards to buy food instead of gifts is one that is running low on options. Compared to getting money from a pawn shop, a gift card is a compelling way to pay. But once that gift card runs out -- and it probably can't buy more than a month or two of groceries, then what?

Wal-Mart Stores (NYSE: WMT) is reportedly aiming to move the music industry right into the anti-piracy technology-free era itself, threatening several label companies that the retail giant will pull their antiquated files from walmart.com if they do not upgrade. Billboard also reported that Wal-Mart's 2% share in the digital store arena may not say much, at least in comparison with Apple Inc. (NASDAQ: AAPL)'s iTunes Store, but the chain's CD sales account for a lot of business in the music industry (Billboard estimates 22%).

That large CD sales market for Wal-Mart is big incentive to see the growth of the music industry in the digital market. As CD sales decline, some have speculated that Wal-Mart may begin to re-size the entertainment department in stores, essentially pushing the market online for consumers. Another interest Billboard notes Wal-Mart may have in the "all-encompassing digital format" is the run against iTunes the company and other digital stores could make, like Amazon.com, Inc. (NASDAQ: AMZN)'s MP3 store. iTunes dominates the digital market, holding 70% of all sales.

It hardly seems "fair" to the record labels and the music industry for retain giants and digital stores to be forcing the change. If these growths and rumors tell us anything, it is that retail chains and digital stores are more attuned to what consumers want than the music industry. This is not a big revelation, but Apple alone has not spearheaded an industry-wide shift away from anti-piracy technology. Apple, Wal-Mart, and Amazon, may not be working together to increase the availability of music, but it appears they have the same goals. They just want sales, and apparently consumers just want easy to access music.

Is online shopping becoming boring to you? While the convenience of internet shopping is extra-handy to those of us with busy lives, the benefits go beyond that: little to no sales taxes for many, free shipping promotions and ever-cheaper prices. The sheer selection of things you can buy online generally outweighs what you can buy in a physical store, too. While there is a social component in many product categories these days -- like teenage clothes and athletic shoes -- that will preclude most from shopping for certain items online, for normal product purchases, you can't beat online shopping.

But at what point does the thrill of saving money, shipping costs and possible sales taxes lose its luster? The 25% growth rate from 2004 slowed down to an estimated 16% growth rate this year. Does this slowdown mean online shoppers are moving back to buying things in person, or they're just not buying as much online?

Will sales at online retailing behemoths like Amazon.com (NASDAQ: AMZN) continue to increase for the foreseeable future? Hard to tell, but like in the case of Wal-Mart Stores (NYSE: WMT), can sales continue at a nice pace (as in, double digit) with annual sales at such a high right now? Just because sales crest using a newer medium (like the decade-old online sales channel), this does not mean folks are becoming bored with online shopping -- it's just the top of the "product cycle" known to economists, but taken to the retail medium. In addition, brick-n-mortar stores and companies have fought hard to lure customers back from online venues and into stores again.

Wal-Mart Stores, Inc.'s (NYSE:WMT) December same-store sales grew 1.6%, and Wal-Mart shares rose above $47.20 today as investors once again fell in love (for the minute) with the world's largest retailer on the heels of December sales results. These, of course, were driven nicely and predictably by holiday sales and so forth. What else is new? Wal-Mart not having a rising December sales month would spell doom for the entire U.S. economy most likely.

Also, Wal-Mart this week unveils that it will re-structure its worker scheduling system to treat employees like inventory, Just In Time employees, as Peter Cohan writes here. This makes sense, as I am sure Wal-Mart wants to maintain a consistent employee-to-customer ratio as possible -- but theories and real practice sometimes don't mix. I'll wait to see how this works before going further with an analysis.

So, it seems like standard Wal-Mart: there is sometimes, scratch that, always a mix of good news and semi-good or bad news streaming in from Wal-Mart these days. So this week's sales numbers and then employees-as-inventory stories follow that tradition. 2007 should be an interesting Wal-Mart year, that is for sure.