If other firms follow Apple's lead in paying an annual dividend then, given the amount of stockpiled cash that the corporate sector is currently hoarding, the resulting boost to personal income and consumption could be significant. Even if firms only paid out 10% of their liquid assets, that would be enough to boost annual disposable income by almost 2% and, even if a lot of that extra income was initially saved, it would probably still boost annual consumption by 1%.
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