Today the Census Department’s Advance Retail Sales reported a 0.25% drop in September. “Real” Retail Sales dropped by 0.27%. But the more accurate Explistats Price-Indexed Sales held steady in September.
There is wide-spread interest in a “Real Retail Sales” number that deflates the published Retail Sales number by the Consumer Price All Items Index.
ExpliStats has gone further, though, and deflated each of the components within the Advance Retail Sales series by a more approprate CPI Index.
See our article on Explistats Price-Indexed Retail Sales.
This is more accurate since it deflates like with like – Gas Station sales by Gasoline prices, for example, and removes CPI items like Housing from the Real Retail Sales picture. For more details on our model please read our fuller explanation.
As we see below, although the headline Retail Sales declined by 0.25% in September, and the “Real” Retail Sales fell by 0.27%, our Price-Indexed Sales were flat in the month.
