US Consumer Spending Slowdown Continues, Retail Sales Report Disappoints Again

[mandy]

Consumer spending barely budged in March, the fourth month in a row that Americans eschewed the shopping mall, seeking to conserve cash in an economic downturn...

Spending is expected to tick up slightly after the government mails out tax rebates in an effort to stimulate the economy. But economists said the rebates were unlikely to prop up sales for long.

“The worry is that after that relief fades away, the consumer will still be faced with the same underlying problems,” Nigel Gault, an economist at Global Insight, a forecasting firm, wrote in a client note. “Any burst of spending based on the stimulus payments is likely to prove short-lived.”...

full article: http://www.nytimes.com/2008/05/02/busine....html?_r=1&partner=rssnyt&emc=rss&oref=slogin