Posted on 09/25/2007 7:22:06 AM PDT by Hydroshock
NEW YORK (AP) -- Worries about jobs and the economy flared in September, driving a key barometer of consumer sentiment to its lowest level in nearly two years, a private research group said Tuesday.
The New York-based Conference Board said its Consumer Confidence Index fell to 99.8, an almost 6-point drop from the revised 105.6 in August. The reading was below the 104.5 that analysts had expected and marked its lowest level since November 2005 when the index was 98.3.
(Excerpt) Read more at money.cnn.com ...
CNN - doing all it can to help the Democrats.
Since unemployment figures were low last week, they have to find something to whine about.
That is an AP article on CNN, reporting widely accepted numbers from the New York-based Conference Board and its Consumer Confidence Index.
CNN can be called guilty of many things, but you are way off on that one.
Anyone who is willing to dismiss this report as partisan is whistling past the graveyard.
Consumer spending and attitudes toward spending are undergoing seismic shifts. You’ll be seeing a lot more of this, leading up to a peak around May 2008.
Inflation concerns are real for consumers, whether or not economists believe there is a risk, and housing ARM resets (still not peaked) coupled with decreased real estate liquidity and tightened consumer and equity credit are crunching the trend of “luxury as necessity” that was evident in consumer spending over the past 6-7 years. People are getting more conservative with spending and/or just running out of ways to dig themselves deeper holes through debt accrual.
CPI and other indices have been cooked for years; the numbers you see reported don’t often tell the half of the story with consumer spending.
IMO, the recession started earlier this year, albeit not in a classical sense. We’ll see some inverted curves that give mixed signals, but despite this the fact is that the economy is in tough shape. Really.
That CNN does not support the Dems ? There’s a reason we call it the “Clinton News Network”.
I agree with you completely about inflation, that the numbers have been cooked for years, but I think the peak will be in November of 2008. Just in time for the election, and we know who CNN wants to help. Hint: it’s not the conservatives.
When you hear “oh woe is us” 24/7 on the MSM, of course confidence drops. There’s no mystery. I’ve never put any stock in consumer confidence numbers. I’ve never seen any correlation between consumer confidence and economic growth.
Weren’t the original August numbers below 100, and the “worst” in 2 years? For some reason I’m remember a very LOW number, like 92.8 or something.
Now they were revised above 100, and the initial September number is low.
Never mind. There are apparently multiple “consumer confidence” numbers. something called the “RBC Cash Index” came out a couple of weeks ago showing a drop.
CPI and other indices have been cooked for years; the numbers you see reported don’t often tell the half of the story with consumer spending.
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I am surprised that anyone ever believed the CPI figures. I have thought for many years that the truth is far worse than the government would admit. I can say for certain that the amount that supported my parents, myself and my three brothers fifty years ago(and I mean our total GROSS income) would not even come close to buying groceries for six people now.
Agree. We've cut back spending dramatically for a year now. Don't bother us not buying a bunch of crap we really don't need anyway. Everything is expensive, so we've just learned to conserve every way possible.
Even our driving habits have changed, we combine trips, don't waste fuel etc. Instead of eating out, we have many more home barbeque's. lol.
When not working, we stay home a lot now, so we've just made the home front more livable and deal with it. I've honestly found being cheap and frugal is fun, and I rather enjoy saving money, energy, doing our own repairs etc.
> I’ve honestly found being cheap and frugal is fun, and I rather enjoy saving money, energy, doing our own repairs etc.<
What you have learned is how to survive and get ahead at the same time.
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