Financial Planning, Budgeting, and Forecasting: Financial Intelligence Collection (7 Books)

CHAPTER NINE

Forecasting Consumer Spending

Numbers, Not Psychology

In part II of this book we saw the large proportion of the U.S. economy represented by consumer spending and, equally important, the degree to which consumer spending drives cycles in industrial production, capital spending, corporate profits, and the stock market. Staying abreast of consumer spending and retail sales is thus a smart move for any businessperson or investor. It is even better to become a smart forecaster of future turning points in consumer demand before its uptrends and downtrends become widely evident and are working their way into business conditions and stock market expectations. That is the goal of part III of this book.

Consumer spending is subject to a wide ...