Preliminary May retail sales figures were released today, and the media gushed. The markets cringed, but that didn't stopped everyone from the Times to AP from touting yet another indicator that the economy was booming.
Yes, booming.
Funny thing, though. As I mentioned in posts previously on this same subject, the retail sales indicator doesn't measure actual "units" of good sold - instead, it's the total sales figure. So if the price of any particular item or items increases substantially, like, say, gasoline, then we could conceivably see a measurable increase in retail sales over a given month.
So let's take a look at the actual numbers for the different business sectors:
| Kind of Business | May 2004 prelim |
| Retail & food Services, total | +1.2 |
| Total (excl. motor vehicle & parts ) | +0.7 |
| Motor vehicle & parts dealers | +2.7 |
| Auto & other motor veh. dealers | +3.0 |
| Furniture & home furnishings stores | -0.6 |
| Electronics & appliance stores | +0.1 |
| Building material & garden eq. & supplies dealers | -1.4 |
| Food & beverage stores | +0.9 |
| Grocery stores | +0.8 |
| Health & personal care stores | +0.9 |
| Gasoline stations | +4.0 |
| Clothing & clothing accessories stores | +0.9 |
| Sporting goods, hobby, book & music stores | +0.1 |
| General merchandise stores | +1.3 |
| Department stores (ex. L.D.) | +0.8 |
| Miscellaneous stores retailers | +1.1 |
| Nonstore retailers | 0.0 |
| Food services & drinking places | -0.3 |
Building materials and garden supplies actually fell in May. May, month of Mother's Day and planting the garden, feeding the yard, building the treehouse for the kids. And those furniture figures are pretty disappointing, but not unexpected, as housing sales have also started to slow in the past few months. Few home purchases, less need for new furniture to fill them.
Not only were gasoline prices up 4% over a single month, but up 22% since last May. Sounds great for the economy, neh?
Posted by MB Williams at June 14, 2004 09:28 PM | TrackBackFood and fuel are up, of course that doesn't matter because they are counted in the "core" inflation rate, just the "core" spending as people try to make it payday to payday.
People are buying less and paying more. When the interest rates are raised by the Fed all of those people who got those "cheap" variable rate mortgages are going to be squeezed by that bill too.
It's startling that gardening, etc. sales are down at the height of the season. Just a thought.
Posted by: Amanda at June 15, 2004 04:50 PM