Year-over-year weather can be used to forecast consumer behavior

Weather sensitive industries makes up about a third of the gross domestic product of the United States, which translates into trillions of dollars. Determining how these industries change with the weather, and climate, can be a major benefit to investors and businesses alike. Quantifying the impact that weather has on consumer goods is difficult due to the rapidly changing economic landscape, but using proprietary sales data as well as historical weather data allows for a determination of change in sales per change in temperature or rainfall. Other metrics such as petroleum and natural gas prices can also be used to show how climate can impact the economy.