Data & Insights

Summer Retail and Food Services Sales Up 2.4% From 2019

Clothiers and fashion accessory stores, however, continue their dramatic slide

august-retail-numbers-CONTENT-2020 — Advance estimates of U.S. retail and food services sales for August 2020 were $537.5 billion. Getty Images

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In spite of recent positive news out of the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics—non-farm payroll employment rose by 1.4 million and the unemployment rate fell by 8.4% in August—advance estimates of retail and food services for the month seem to suggest that Americans are spending cautiously as the threat of Covid-19 and major economic fallout still looms.

While the U.S. Census Bureau’s advance August 2020 sales report shows a year-over-year increase of 2.6% compared to August 2019, and a month-to-month increase of 0.6%