Personal Income increased 0.3% in August; Spending increased 0.4%

by Calculated Risk on 9/30/2022 08:39:00 AM

The BEA released the Personal Income and Outlays, August 2022 and Annual Update report:

Personal income increased $71.6 billion (0.3 percent) in August, according to estimates released today by the Bureau of Economic Analysis. Disposable personal income (DPI) increased $67.6 billion (0.4 percent) and personal consumption expenditures (PCE) increased $67.5 billion (0.4 percent).

The PCE price index increased 0.3 percent. Excluding food and energy, the PCE price index increased 0.6 percent. Real DPI increased 0.1 percent in August and Real PCE increased 0.1 percent; goods decreased 0.2 percent and services increased 0.2 percent.
emphasis added

The August PCE price index increased 6.2 percent year-over-year (YoY), down from 6.4 percent YoY in July.

The PCE price index, excluding food and energy, increased 4.9 percent YoY, up from 4.7% in July.

The following graph shows real Personal Consumption Expenditures (PCE) through August 2022 (2012 dollars). Note that the y-axis doesn’t start at zero to better show the change.

Click on graph for larger image.

The dashed red lines are the quarterly levels for real PCE.

Personal income was at expectations, and PCE was above expectations.

Inflation was slightly higher than expected.

Using the two-month method to estimate Q3 real PCE growth, real PCE was increasing at a 0.8% annual rate in Q3 2022. (Using the mid-month method, real PCE was increasing at 0.9%)