How far will $100 go at the supermarket? Not as far as in 2019. While food inflation has slowed in recent months, costs continue to climb at the grocery store, The Wall Street Journal (WSJ) reported Thursday (April 4). It analyzed NielsenIQ data on various commonly purchased goods that...
ADP’s latest employment report shows a jump in raises for people switching jobs. While year-over-year pay increases last month for people who stayed at their jobs were flat after months of continued slowing, gains for people changing jobs jumped “dramatically” to 10%, the second straight monthly increase, according...
Manufacturing activity in the United States rose in March for the first time in more than a year. The Institute for Supply Management’s monthly report on business, released Monday (April 1), showed output growth of 54.6%, the strongest reading since June 2022. “Demand remains at the early...
Consumers keep spending, income growth is muted, and inflation is still here. Bit by bit, debt obligations are eating into disposable income growth. As to whether these pressures may prove a headwind for consumers’ opening their wallets — well, that remains to be seen. There...
Three months ago feels like a long time. But the latest — and revised — data on gross domestic product released Thursday (March 28) by the Bureau of Economic Analysis details the fourth quarter and gives some hints as to what may come in the months ahead. The headline...
Rising prices at fast food eateries and other restaurants reportedly have lower-income diners pulling back. Around a quarter of low-income consumers — those who make under $50,000 a year — said they were eating less fast food, while roughly half said they were making fewer trips to...
Large players in the grocery industry took advantage of the pandemic’s supply chain problems to raise prices and profits and keep them high. So said the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) in a press release and staff report issued Thursday (March 21). “As the pandemic illustrated,...
Call it status quo — and maybe a sense of ennui? The latest, preliminary readings of consumer sentiment for the month of March, issued Friday (March 15) by the University of Michigan, found that things are little changed. The latest calculation came in at 76.5...
We may have to wait a bit longer for rate cuts. And for the U.S. consumer, inflation’s a stubborn fact of life — volatile, to be sure — and it seems like when one category of spending becomes more manageable, others become more expensive. In...
