Posted on 06/16/2020 8:42:41 AM PDT by Republican Wildcat
Retail sales rebounded in May as states eased coronavirus-induced lockdown measures, allowing retail stores to regain more ground than analysts expected, according to Department of Commerce data.
Retail sales jumped 17.7% in May, effectively doubling expectations and marking the biggest single-month gain in records going back more than 20 years, according to a Commerce Department report released Tuesday. A Bloomberg News survey of economists had anticipated 8.4% increase in retail sales in May as COVID-19-related measures melted away following a 14% decline in April.
COVID-19 originated in Wuhan, China, in late December before going global, killing a reported 116,000 people in the United States. Governors and mayors across the United States instituted strict stay-at-home orders to slow the pandemic.
There was also a 44.1% increase in motor vehicle sales, as well as a 29.1% jump in restaurant receipts, data show, which account for more than half of the overall increase in retail sales, suggesting the economy is bouncing back faster than anticipated.
Jobs are coming back as well. Payroll employment rose by 2.5 million in May, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics report published June 5, and the number of unemployed dropped by 2.1 million to a total 21.0 million.
President Donald Trump touted news of the retail numbers on Twitter Tuesday morning.
(Excerpt) Read more at dailycaller.com ...
Open the economy!
Commie Lefties are NOT going to like this news!!
“There was also a 44.1% increase in motor vehicle sales...”
Pleases me, but always puzzles me. I haven’t bought a car since 2008, LOL!
Same thing with furniture stores. The biggest city near me, 200K, has a zillion furniture stores and NONE of them are going under, even through all of the shutdowns.
Who is buying new furniture so often, especially in a slow housing market?
Agree - but a lot of people like a “fresh pair of wheels” rather than keeping a car a long time even if there is nothing wrong with it.
I guess with that and the furniture thing is that doesn’t take but a small portion of the population to need to buy those things at any given time to keep them afloat.
Because I was home and paid for no entertainment beyond what the internet provides, I saved a TON of money. I am planning to upgrade my washing machine and dryer at the Fourth of July sales. The rest is being socked away.
If there are others like me, they may have a little extra to change something out.
Democrat party will double down on lockdowns and send more infected people into nursing homes.
My sister, who had eaten lunch and dinner out daily, doughnut and coffee runs, too, and runs a bar tab with dinner, has saved thousands.
She, and two others, were just laid off from their jobs at a big University - not her fault - but Covid19 showed that those three jobs COULD be done on-line with a semi-trained monkey running the show.
Wonder if she’s learned anything through all of this? I’ll have to ask her. Probably not. She’s a Lib. *SNORT* ;)
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