Retail Sales Up, Jobless Claims Down, Recession Fetishists Staying In Bed

Move along, folks.  There's nothing to see here.

A cheerful start to the holiday shopping season apparently produced much faster retail sales growth last month than economists had expected.

The Commerce Department said November retail sales rose 1.2 pct, twice the expected 0.6 pct increase, following an unrevised 0.2 pct September increase.

Or here.

Seasonally adjusted initial jobless claims fell 7,000 to 333,000 in the week ended Dec. 8, the government reported Thursday.

Wall Street analysts were looking for initial claims of 335,000. Economists watch claims closely because an increase is a leading indicator of a slowdown.

Wholesale inflation jumped way up in November, driven primarily by rising fuel costs (which helped push the robust sales number), but excluding gas and automobiles, retail sales were still up by 1.1%.