Global data created per year

As global data creation has exploded, US pet industry spending has grown, a correlation of 0.985 that connects zettabytes to kibble with the digital confidence of a chart that treats server farms and pet farms as equivalent economic categories. The data fills the cloud, the bowl fills with food, and both numbers grow because the same smartphone-enabled economy produces both streams of output.

Global data grew from about 15 to over 120 zettabytes between 2015 and 2023. Pet spending grew from about 67 billion to over 136 billion dollars. Both are smooth growth curves in the digital economy: data grows because every transaction generates records, and pet spending grows because e-commerce (itself a data generator) makes premium pet products accessible. The same Amazon order that adds to global data totals also adds to pet industry revenue when the order is for dog food.

Nine years of data and pet spending is a correlation where the two variables are commercially intertwined: pet products are increasingly bought online, and online purchases generate data. The order is placed, the data is created, the treat is delivered, and the chart records all three as the same economic activity. The cloud stores the data. The dog eats the treat. The economy enables both.