Jim Sullivan Consumer Quotations

Consumer spending growth has generally been trending at about 2.5-to-3 percent at an annual rate -- not booming, but not terrible, ... The fact that the job market is still weak is restraining optimism a bit; hopefully, as the recovery gathers pace, we will start to see more job growth.

In our forecast, we see consumer spending slowing a little bit in the fourth quarter to 3.1 percent from 3.8 percent for the same period last year, ... The rationale is that as the housing market slows , there'll be a cooling effect in the home wealth effect and the fluctuating energy prices will also have some drag on spending in the months ahead.

In the whole post-war rebound story, the first part has come through -- we've clearly seen a bounce in consumer confidence. The next key step is business activity measures improving, including employment indicators. Hopefully we will see weekly jobless claims coming down soon -- in the next three-to-four weeks.

Certainly, the degree of strength through August is not sustainable; we'll get a much weaker number in September. But the third quarter as a whole will still show 5 to 6 percent consumer spending growth, even if we get a negative number in September.

The clear message seems to be that while oil is a drag, it's not a downward driver of consumer spending, ... The labor market is generating good income in general and the housing market continues to deliver a positive wealth effect. These factors are helping to offset the impact of higher oil prices.