American Consumer Spending Continues to Falter

According to a new Gallup poll, consumers have shopped with care so far this summer:

Most Americans are using cost-saving measures to purchase items this summer. A majority have recently bought generic goods and gone online to find the best deal, while fewer have gone shopping for fun or made major purchases.

While the news may be good for Amazon.com Inc. (NASDAQ: AMZN) and makers of generic products, for brand-based companies from Tiffany & Co. (NYSE: TIF) to Procter & Gamble Co. (NYSE: PG) earnings improvements will be hard to come by.

The measures of the caution show up in a few of the Gallup results: 55% have a “strict budget,” 58% have used coupons, 59% have gone online to compare prices. At the other end of the spectrum, only 27% have “made a major purchase” that cost at least a week’s pay.

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There could be several causes for the light spending. Among them are signs that inflation has returned, in large part due to high energy prices. Another is that while unemployment has fallen from 10% during the worst of the recession to just above 6% more recently, the figure is still short of the 5% that is normal in a full recovery.

Another Gallup measure of consumer caution that has had some positive effect is the level to which consumers have become savers. Some 62% say that “when they get money, they always save part of it,” in contrast of 16% who say “when they get money, they spend it right away.” If history is any guide, some of that saved money will come back into the economy as it improves, or as people move into retirement.

Economists are waiting to see whether horrible GDP numbers from the first quarter will improve throughout the remainder of the year. Those figures may, but only by a modest measure, if the Gallup numbers are right.

Methodology: Results for this Gallup poll are based on telephone interviews conducted June 9 to 15, 2014, with a random sample of 1,029 adults, aged 18 and older, living in all 50 U.S. states and the District of Columbia.

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