by Calculated Risk on 9/27/2019 08:38:00 AM

The BEA released the Personal Income and Outlays report for August:

Personal income increased $73.5 billion (0.4 percent) in August according to estimates released today by the Bureau of Economic Analysis. Disposable personal income (DPI) increased $77.7 billion (0.5 percent) and personal consumption expenditures (PCE) increased $20.1 billion (0.1 percent).

Real DPI increased 0.4 percent in August and Real PCE increased 0.1 percent. The PCE price index increased less than 0.1 percent. Excluding food and energy, the PCE price index increased 0.1 percent.

The August PCE price index increased 1.4 percent year-over-year and the August PCE price index, excluding food and energy, increased 1.8 percent year-over-year.

The following graph shows real Personal Consumption Expenditures (PCE) through August 2019 (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.

The increase in personal income was at expectations,  and the increase in PCE was below expectations.

Note that core PCE inflation was up 1.8% YoY.

Using the two-month method to estimate Q2 PCE growth, PCE was increasing at a 2.8% annual rate in Q3 2019. (using the mid-month method, PCE was increasing at 2.3%). This suggests slower PCE growth in Q3 than in Q2.