… the news media hypes the increase in retail sales over the previous month.
And once again Calculated Risk provides the perspective the mainstream news media somehow seems incapable of presenting.
Click, you can just look at the charts.
Or, as the Census Bureau puts it:
“[A]n increase of 2.7 percent (±0.5%) from the previous month, but 5.3 percent (±0.7%) below August 2008. Total sales for the June through August 2009 period were down 7.6 percent (±0.3%) from the same period a year ago.”
The increase in August over July was mostly subsidized car sales (cash for clunkers) and an increase in gasoline prices.