Economy in Brief

Last week, the pump price for regular gasoline retraced the penny increase of the prior week and slipped to $3.10 per gallon. Still, prices remained the firmest since October 2008 and were nearly double the December-2008 low of $1.61. [...]

The Composite Index from the Institute for Supply Management increased last month to 60.8 from a revised 58.5 during December. The figure easily beat consensus expectations for a reading of 58.0. The latest was the highest level since [...]

Kaput is what kaput does - German retail sales are off by 0.3% in nominal terms in December and by the same proportion in real terms in December. In both real and nominal terms German retail sales are getting progressively weaker from [...]

Rising food and oil prices and the large proportion of young people in the populations of Egypt, Tunisia and Yemen are inciting the citizens of these countries, finally, to revolt against long standing grievances. Data on these [...]

Intuit compiles data covering small business employment and the figures indicate that jobs have been improving with the economic recovery. The 0.3% m/m gain in the January Employment Index added to 0.4% increases during each of the [...]

Personal income turned the corner last year into positive territory. For the full year, the pickup in income growth to 3.0% from -1.7% reflected positive growth in hourly earnings, a lessened decline in employment and growth in [...]

Consumer sentiment bounced back late this month from some mid-month apprehension. As a result, the full-month reading just slipped from December. The January reading of consumer sentiment from the University of Michigan dipped just [...]

The employment cost index for private industry workers held at a 0.4% increase in Q4 for total compensation. However, the four-quarter gain improved moderately to 2.0%, its highest in two years. Private sector wages & salaries [...]