UK economists are scratching their heads today over a shocking rise in retail sales recorded during May. After all, we're supposed to be in the midst of a slowdown, recession, stagflation, etc. Depends on what day you read the papers. If you took all this to heart, you'd think we should all just pack it in.
But the numbers, released Friday by the government, seem to have taken all the economic "know-it-alls" for a loop. Some are saying the numbers can't possibly be right and are making the assumption that some fatal flaw will be discovered to discredit the numbers shortly.
The month on month rise of 3.5% is also a record since this data was first tallied and bests the 3.2% rise recorded in 1991. Sales were up 8.2 percent from last May. The rise was led by a 9.2% month-to-month increase in clothing and shoes, which was attributed to stocking up on seasonal items.
2 comments:
Hmmm, the article doesn't discuss whether the index includes season adjustments. Still, encouraging, tentative news.
Thanks for writing this.
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