Economy
January 30, 2014
Consumer Confidence- January 2014
Written by Peter Wright
Both the expectations and the view of the present situation improved in the mind of consumers in January according to the latest Conference Board analysis. We thought it would be interesting to take a longer term view this month because our past analyses have been somewhat overshadowed by the surging confidence of the late 1990s.
If we look back to 1980 the average composite monthly value of confidence has been 93.8. The result for January 2014 was 80.7 with a three month moving average of 76.7, still a ways to go to reach the long term average (Figure 1). On a year over year basis the composite value is up by 11.2, expectations are up by 7.7 and the view of the present situation by 16.2 (Table 1). The view of the job market is still poor but improving and more people expect a wage increase than a decrease. Consumers buying plans for automobiles and houses are improving but for appliances are falling. (Source: The Conference Board)
