- by New Deal democrat
[Updated with graphs]
This morning's retail sales report gives us confirmation that the consumer economy - about 70% of the entire US economy - is alright.
While we don't know what the CPI for January is yet, we do know that gas prices continued to decline smartly, so I am not expecting a number over +0.1%, and truth be told, I am not expecting a positive number at all.
Not only was January a positive both including and excluding autos, but December was revised significantly higher, from -0.1% to +.2%.
Here is a graph for nominal (blue) and real (red) retail sales:
For what it's worth, YoY real retail sales for January will probably wind up near +2.5%:
since last January's decline of -0.3% in retail sales falls out of the comparison:
Here's the bottom line:
1..Workers/consumers have more jobs, and are making and spending more money.
2. Producers of commodities, and utilities and transporters of commodities are experiencing a very intense downturn, that so far has not dragged down non-commodity industrial production at all.
