When I read through this thread I realized i didn’t really know what the Consumer Confidence Index was, or how it was constructed. I’ve linked to it. It seems that the relatively small sample size makes any one months number suspect and that perhaps the suggestion of giving more weight tot he moving average would be better.

I’m a big believer in the reality that we never got out of recession, so for me there is no sense in trying to parse the tea leaves to know when we go back in. That being said, its hard to believe that consumer confidence is as high as it has been, considering unemployment really hasn’t gone down at all. To me its no surprise that confidence numbers are decreasing now that ever more are falling off the back of the bus.
Josh