Written by Steven Hansen
The headline data this month showed improved consumer expenditures and income – but inflation adjusted values were significantly worse.
Analyst Opinion of Personal Income and Expenditures
Personal consumption has been the major driver of GDP since the end of the Great Recession. Inflation however, is dragging down the nominal numbers – and year-over-year consumption continues to outpace income growth. Remember these are average numbers – not median. The rate of growth of consumption is slowing which does not bode well for 2Q2017 GDP.
The backward revisions this month SIGNIFICANTLY affected the year-over-year rate of growth for both income and expenditures.
- The market looks at current values (not real inflation adjusted) and was expecting (from Bloomberg):.
| Consensus Range | Consensus | Actual | |
| Personal Income – M/M change | 0.3 % to 0.5 % | +0.4 % | + 0.4 % |
| Consumer Spending – M/M change | 0.3 % to 0.5 % | +0.4 % | + 0.4 % |
| PCE Price Index — M/M change | -0.1 % to 0.2 % | +0.2 % | + 0.2 % |
| Core PCE price index – M/M change | 0.1 % to 0.1 % | +0.1 % | + 0.2 % |
| PCE Price Index — Y/Y change | 1.5 % to 1.7 % | +1.7 % | + 1.7 % |
| Core PCE price index – Yr/Yr change | 1.4 % to 1.6 % | +1.5 % | + 1.5 % |
- The monthly fluctuations are confusing. Looking at the inflation adjusted 3 month trend rate of growth, disposable income growth rate trend is declining while consumption’s growth rate is improving.
- Real Disposable Personal Income is up 1.9 % year-over-year (published 2.4 % last month – now revised to 2.0 %), and real consumption expenditures is up 2.6 % year-over-year (published 2.8 % last month – now revised to 3.1 %)
- this data is very noisy and as usual includes moderate backward revision – this month the changes modified the year-over-year trends.
- The advance estimate of 1Q2017 GDP indicated the economy was expanding at 1.2 % (quarter-over-quarter compounded). Expenditures are counted in GDP, and income is ignored as GDP measures the spending side of the economy. However, over periods of time – consumer income and expenditure grow at the same rate.
- The savings rate continues to be low historically, and was unchanged at 5.3 % this month [last month it was published the savings rate was 5.9% – and it was downwardly revised to 5.3%].
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The inflation adjusted income and consumption are “chained”, and headline GDP is inflation adjusted. This means the impact to GDP is best understood by looking at the chained numbers. Econintersect believes year-over-year trends are very revealing in understanding economic dynamics.
Per capita inflation adjusted expenditure has exceeded the pre-recession peak.
Seasonally and Inflation Adjusted Expenditure Per Capita
​Backward revisions this month:
This news release includes revised estimates of wages and salaries, personal taxes, and contributions for government social insurance for October through December 2016 (fourth quarter). These estimates reflect the incorporation of the most recently available fourth-quarter wage and salary tabulations from the Bureau of Labor Statistics’ Quarterly Census of Employment and Wages (QCEW) program.
Estimates have been updated for October 2016 through March 2017. The percent change from the preceding month for current-dollar personal income and for current-dollar and chained (2009) dollar DPI and PCE — revised and previously published — are shown below for February and March.
The graph below illustrates the relationship between income (DPI) and expenditures (PCE) – showing clearly income and expenditures grow at nearly the same rate over time.
Indexed to Jan 2000, Growth of Real Disposable Income (blue line) to Real Expenditures (red line)
The short term trends are mixed depending on the periods selected – but spending remains historically elevated.
Seasonally Adjusted Spending’s Ratio to Income (a declining ratio means consumer is spending less of its Income)
PCE is the spending of consumers. In the USA, the consumer is the economy. Likewise, personal income is the money consumers earn to spend. Even though most analysts concentrate on personal expenditures because GDP is based on spending, increases in personal income allow consumers the option to spend more.
There is a general correlation of PCE to GDP (PCE is a component of GDP).
Seasonally and Inflation Adjusted Year-over-Year Change of Personal Consumption Expenditures (blue line) to GDP (red line)
Econintersect and GDP uses the inflation adjusted (chained) numbers. Disposable Personal Income (DPI) is the income after the taxes.
Seasonally & Inflation Adjusted Percent Change From the Previous Month – Personal Disposable Income (red line) and Personal Consumption Expenditures (blue line)
Yet year-over-year growth for income and expenditures is below GDP year-over-year growth.
Seasonally & Inflation Adjusted Year-over-Year Change – Personal Disposable Income (red line) and Personal Consumption Expenditures (blue line)
The savings rate has been bouncing around – but the general trend is down. In an economy driven by consumers, a higher savings rate does not bode well for increased GDP. This is one reason GDP may not be a good single metric of economic activity. The question remains what is the optimal savings rate for the current demographics. It might be expected that as people near retirement, the savings rate rises and after people retire, savings rate falls. Econintersect is not aware of any study which documents this effect. The graph below is from BEA table 2.6. The savings rate is now 5.9 % – last month was a revised 5.7 %.
Personal Savings as a Percentage of Disposable Personal Income
And one look at the different price changes seen by the BEA in this PCE release versus the BEA’s GDP and BLS’s Consumer Price Index (CPI). We should note that the inflation adjustment is for PCE and Personal Income is usually lower than the ones used for GDP and CPI.
Year-over-Year Change – PCE’s Price Index (blue line) versus CPI-U (red line) versus GDP Deflator (green line)
Finally for recession watchers, here is the graph below, here are the elements used to mark a recession. (1) personal income less transfer payments, in real terms and (2) employment. In addition, we refer to two indicators with coverage primarily of manufacturing and goods: (3) industrial production and (4) the volume of sales of the manufacturing and wholesale-retail sectors adjusted for price changes.
If a line falls below the 0 (black line) – that sector is contracting from the previous month. Personal income is the blue line. Note – the below graph uses multipliers to make movements more obvious (ignore the value of the scale, only consider whether the graph is above [good] or below [bad] the zero line).
Month-over-Month Growth Personal Income less transfer payments (blue line), Employment (red line), Industrial Production (green line), Business Sales (orange line)
Caveats on the Use of Personal Income and Consumption Expenditure Data
PCE is a fairly noisy index and subject at times to significant backward revision. This index cannot be relied upon in real time.
This personal income and personal consumption expenditure data by itself is not a good tool to warn of an upcoming recession. Econintersect has shown that PCE is a distraction for recession watchers, with moves over a few months having a 30% accuracy of indicating a recession start, and a 70% incidence of indicating a non-recessionary event. The graph below shows the lack of correlation. Note, however, that PCE does have prolonged declines over many months associated with recessions but these long declines are not very good in “predicting” a recession until it is already underway.
Readers are warned that this article is based on seasonally adjusted data. Monthly non-adjusted data is available with a delay of several months.
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