🇺🇸 Americans rated the next six months a 68.2... The Conference Board treats anything under 80 as a recession warning, and August just went well below it.
The Conference Board’s Consumer Confidence Index slipped to 89.4 in August, the weakest since January and a miss versus the 90.2 economists wanted, 2 months down in a row.
Every piece of that future gauge got worse:
* Business outlook: net −6.3%
* Labor-market outlook: net −11.5%
* Income expectations: still positive at +3.8%, but down 3.1 points
The Present Situation Index also jumped 6.8 points to 121.2, the first gain in four months, highest since May.
More consumers called jobs “plentiful” (27.0%, up from 24.4%), and fewer said jobs are “hard to get” (19.5%, down from 21.7%). The jobs differential rose to +7.5%.
That is the disconnect.
The labor market still feels intact enough in August, but the forward view does not.
Write-in answers explain why: Prices, gas, groceries, trade, jobs, war and conflict. Inflation expectations ticked up to 5.8% from 5.6%, and people can hold a job and still feel the ground moving.
Consumer spending is the engine of the U.S. economy... But confidence usually cracks before the register does.
First people delay the big purchases; car, the trip, the new couch. Then retail softens, then businesses cut hours, then hiring slows, which is the thing households are already afraid of.
Right now the data is saying the present is holding, and the future is not. If that gap stays this wide, things will continue going downhill.
The Conference Board’s Consumer Confidence Index slipped to 89.4 in August, the weakest since January and a miss versus the 90.2 economists wanted, 2 months down in a row.
Every piece of that future gauge got worse:
* Business outlook: net −6.3%
* Labor-market outlook: net −11.5%
* Income expectations: still positive at +3.8%, but down 3.1 points
The Present Situation Index also jumped 6.8 points to 121.2, the first gain in four months, highest since May.
More consumers called jobs “plentiful” (27.0%, up from 24.4%), and fewer said jobs are “hard to get” (19.5%, down from 21.7%). The jobs differential rose to +7.5%.
That is the disconnect.
The labor market still feels intact enough in August, but the forward view does not.
Write-in answers explain why: Prices, gas, groceries, trade, jobs, war and conflict. Inflation expectations ticked up to 5.8% from 5.6%, and people can hold a job and still feel the ground moving.
Consumer spending is the engine of the U.S. economy... But confidence usually cracks before the register does.
First people delay the big purchases; car, the trip, the new couch. Then retail softens, then businesses cut hours, then hiring slows, which is the thing households are already afraid of.
Right now the data is saying the present is holding, and the future is not. If that gap stays this wide, things will continue going downhill.
