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Economic Indicator? A Surprise in US February Retail Sales

March 12th, 2010 categories: For Buyers, For Sellers, Lake Tahoe Real Estate, National real estate news, South Lake Tahoe, CA, Stateline, NV

An Unexpected Report comes with Two of Temperament.

We thought this New York Times article interesting. The report states that US retail sales, rather than an expected decline, increased surprisingly.

What we like is reports like this indicates that the public is gaining confidence in the US economy. One economist, Alan Levenson at T. Rowe Price, says "the consumer continues to come out of its shell after the shell-shock of the recession." He cites the following:

employment is falling slower
wages are growing
the number of hours being worked is expanding
incomes are up slightly

Whatever enthusiasm this brings is somewhat tempered by two other reports: one showed business inventories remained flat in January. Another report recorded a dip in consumer sentiment in March due to continuing unease in the US unemployment rate.

Nevertheless, the surprise gain in retail sales is a sense that Americans are beginning to spend again. While economists do not expect consumer spending alone to pick up at a sufficient pace to lead the economy out of its downturn, it will probably continue to add modestly to growth.

(full article here)