Consumer Spending

U.S. personal incomes rose at their fastest rate in more than five years, and consumer spending accelerated, setting the stage for a fine holiday shopping season and, possibly, for yet another Federal Reserve Board interest-rate increase.Incomes rose 1.3 percent in October to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of $7.941 trillion after holding steady in September, the largest rise since a like-sized increase in April 1994, the Commerce Department announced yesterday.Last month's growth derived some of its strength from emergency subsidies to farmers, and still more from bonuses paid to unionized auto and aerospace workers as part of contract settlements.

Recessions are not inevitable adjustments built into the clockwork of a modern economy. Businesses no longer make products on long lead times and stumble into excess inventories of cars and appliances, triggering layoffs and pauses in consumer spending. Computer-aided supply-chain management and tracking of customer purchases allow businesses to better align what they make to what can be sold. However, recessions still happen, because of external shocks - natural disasters and political events - as well as errors of judgment and greed.

The nation's economy shook off its recent torpor to grow at a solid 3.4 percent annual pace in the second quarter, the government reported yesterday, as improving business investment and higher exports worked to offset a sharp slowdown in consumer spending. The Commerce Department's report on gross domestic product modestly topped the 3.2 percent most economists had been expecting, and it was also the best performance since the first quarter of 2006, when the economy was riding the final months of the boom in the housing industry.

HERE'S a paradox to ponder: The U.S. economy flourishes in the face of the global financial meltdown that reached the crisis stage last year, only to see growth squeezed when the once-brutalized markets abroad regain their health.While some economists say this won't happen soon, others say it's possible with the worst of the Asian contagion apparently history and with countries like South Korea, Japan and Germany showing signs of revival."Their bad luck has been our good luck," says Ira Silver, chief economist for retailer J. C. Penney & Co. Inc.For the United States, that good luck has translated into good fortune.

Consumer confidence slipped in July after eight straight months of climbing to a record high level, suggesting that a recent increase in interest rates succeeded in cooling the feverish economy.Economists were surprised by the degree of the drop, but said yesterday that they were not worried about cracks in the eerie glaze of happiness that has carried the nation to new heights of prosperity."The euphoria continues, and consumers will remain very aggressive spenders," said Mark Zandi, chief economist for RFA of West Chester, Pa.The July survey showed that the consumer confidence index dropped 3.4 points to 135.6 after reaching a 30-year peak of 139 in June, the Conference Board reported yesterday.

Strong consumer spending in April boosted retail sales above expectations at the nation's biggest chain stores, despite an Easter holiday that fell in March this year.Spring apparel and home goods led the way for average sales to rise above the 3 percent analysts had predicted.But some major chains, notably Target and Sears, Roebuck and Co., reported lower sales.Specialty stores such as AnnTaylor Stores Corp., Limited Inc. and Talbots fared especially well, which the chains said should lead to better-than-expected first-quarter earnings, to be released later this month.

WASHINGTON -- U.S. retail sales surged during the first two months of the year as job security and low prices sent consumers to auto dealerships, building supply stores and clothing retailers, the government reported yesterday.Retail sales rose 0.9 percent to $236.5 billion in last month, after a 1 percent January increase that the Commerce Department previously estimated at just 0.2 percent.Also reported yesterday:U.S. workers filed 289,000 new claims for jobless benefits last week, 1,000 more than the week before, the U.S. Labor Department reported.

WASHINGTON -- U.S. consumer prices rose in 1998 at their slowest pace in 12 years and retail sales surged in December, capping a year in which rising wages allowed consumer spending to increase at its fastest pace since 1984 and energized the economy's longest peacetime expansion.The consumer price index rose 1.6 percent last year, less than 1997's 1.7 percent increase and the lowest annual inflation rate since 1986, the Labor Department reported yesterday. In December, prices rose only 0.1 percent as declines in gasoline and home heating oil prices offset higher cigarette prices.

IF YOU FEEL like you're inundated by economic statistics, you're right.Economists say hundreds, perhaps thousands, of major and minor economic indicators are spewed out regularly.There's the GDP, PPI, CPI and ECI. There are stats on worker productivity, worker inactivity and worker spending proclivity.Want to know what Alan Greenspan is thinking? Check the Briefcase Index. (It's good news if the Federal Reserve chairman carries a thin briefcase into a policy meeting; bad news if it's thick.

WASHINGTON -- U.S. consumers spent freely in the first six weeks of the year, offering more evidence the economy is growing faster than Federal Reserve policymakers and other analysts expect, figures released yesterday showed.Retail sales grew 0.5 percent in early February, following a revised 1.0 percent increase in January -- 10 times the increase initially reported. "It certainly will raise questions about whether it's realistic for the Fed to assume the economy will slow much because of Asia," said Michael Englund, chief economist at Standard & Poor's MMS in Belmont, Calif.

Consumers are expected to continue to spend cautiously this holiday season, with the National Retail Federation to announce today that it predicts a 1 percent decline in sales as people continue to worry about their jobs and the economy. This year will be the second-weakest holiday season since the federation began tracking sales more than 40 years ago, with sales coming in at $437.6 billion. Last year was the only other time the retail trade group has reported a decline in spending, with sales dropping 3.4 percent in November and December.

Would forgiving student loans be good for the economy? A campaign is under way to get student loans forgiven so grads can spend their money on other things. Proponents say this would stimulate the economy. Mark Kantrowitz, publisher of Fin-Aid.org, crunched some numbers. Kantrowitz says there is $730 billion in outstanding student loans - $598 billion in federal loans, $132 billion in private loans. But to have an immediate impact on the economy, Kantrowitz notes, you have to consider only loans that are in repayment because that's money now going to loans and not other consumer spending.

The American wallet is tight but not closed shut. Last week's dismal report on gross domestic product contained the silver lining that consumer spending rose at a decent pace in the first quarter after crashing at the end of 2008. GDP fell at an annual rate of 6.1 percent, but consumer spending increased at a rate of 2.2 percent after plunging at a 4.3 percent pace in the fourth quarter. That's pretty impressive in a period when the stock market fell by a fourth before recovering somewhat.

WASHINGTON -U.S. retailers rang up their largest increase in sales in more than a year during January, rebounding strongly after a six-month string of sharp declines, the Commerce Department reported yesterday. Retail sales rose 1 percent on a seasonally adjusted basis last month, marking the first increase since June and the largest percentage increase since November 2007. The gain was unexpected, with economists surveyed by MarketWatch looking for a decline of 0.4 percent. But economists tempered their enthusiasm over the better-than-expected results, believing that the improvement might have been largely the result of problems seasonally adjusting the data after an especially horrid holiday sales season.

The U.S. economy started the new year on weaker footing as recession-shocked Americans retrenched further, forcing retailers to ring up fewer sales and factories to cut back production. The Federal Reserve's new snapshot of business conditions nationwide widely known as its Beige Book, released yesterday, suggested the country's economic picture has darkened during the past two months. The outlook appears equally dim. "Overall economic activity continued to weaken across almost all of the Federal Reserve's districts," the report concluded.

Tumbling gasoline prices gave consumers more purchasing power last month, which led to a rise in real consumer spending even as personal income slips and Americans worry about their jobs in a rapidly weakening economy. The Commerce Department reported yesterday that consumer spending, when adjusted for inflation, rose 0.6 percent in November, its largest gain in two years. The increase followed a 0.5 percent decline in October. And while the unadjusted rate of consumer spending declined 0.6 percent in November, on the heels of a 1 percent drop in October, economists suggested that the relative increase in spending was a rare piece of good news for the faltering economy.

Christmas cheer is hard to find this year, and harder to hang on to. I know I lost mine when Wal-Mart's chief marketing officer, Stephen Quinn, declared, with smug self-assurance, "We know that Mom's not going to cancel Christmas." Yeah? How do we know that? And why is it up to us moms anyway? Why not have Dad make the decision this year: Is there enough money for Christmas? Let him make the tough call. Let him tell the kids. Quinn thinks it is mothers who don't have the heart to cancel Christmas.

I e-mailed a guy I know and received the following "out of office" reply: "On October 30, 2008 Verizon tapped me on the shoulder with the Reduction In Force package. Hence, I am no longer in the office. If you need to contact me you have my number. It has been a pleasure working with you. Maybe our paths will cross again!" I guess I'll have to call the guy on his cell phone, assuming he still has one. Next night, I bumped into another guy I hadn't seen in a while. We talked about our kids for a minute, and then he said he'd just lost his job. Company folded.

So let me see if I understand this: We're supposed to go shopping for the good of the country. We don't have a president standing on the rubble of the American economy saying as much this time, but that's the message again. If, this holiday season, we don't buy electronics we don't need, if we don't buy new cars instead of fixing old ones, then this whole thing is going to fall apart, and we'll be in for a much longer, colder recessionary winter than already feared. That's what I'm getting from Washington and the Democrats' push for a new stimulus package of as much as $100 billion to consumers.

As a government report showed yesterday that sales at the nation's retailers plunged to record lows in October, employees at Lauman's Home Furnishings in Perry Hall prepared to shut down for good. Sales at the 27-year-old furniture store on Belair Road slowed during the past year after customers lost jobs, were turned down for credit or put off buying new sofas, chairs and other furnishings amid the housing slump. But in the past two months, "It just really went beyond slow, and what else do you do?"