“On a year-over-year basis, November retail sales increased 6.9%. So far, consumers are learning to deal with the taxing effect of high energy prices.”
Consumers are learning to deal with higher energy and a housing depression?? I aint buying into that. Here is a look at Dec retail numbers.
“Retailers Report Weak Results for December As Gas Prices, Slumping Housing Market Take Toll
NEW YORK (AP) — An already weak holiday shopping season turned out to be even worse than expected for many of the nation’s retailers, who reported Thursday they had disappointing sales results for December. The poor performance raised more concerns about consumer spending, and in turn, the health of the economy.
The weak results came from across all retail categories, and prompted many stores to lower their fourth-quarter earnings forecasts. Particularly hard hit were apparel sellers including Limited Brands Inc. and AnnTaylor Stores Corp., as well as department stores including Macy’s Inc. Among the few bright spots was Wal-Mart Stores Inc., which posted results that exceeded Wall Street expectations, as it benefited from shoppers trading down to cheaper stores amid higher gas prices and a slumping housing market.”
I do think that exports are the bright spot in this whole picture. And that is a wild card on how much it impacts job growth. Again the debate seems to be surrounding this decoupling from the US thing. To me decoupling is sounding more and more like rhetoric and not fact. The US economy is still large enough to trigger a global recession. If that happens it will throw water on our exports. It is the extent of the housing slump and resulting credit crunch and its true impact on the consumer that is being underestimated here IMHO. Lets be honest this is not an easy year figuring out where to put your money.
