With all the gloom still coming out in the news just before a big holiday perhaps it is time once again to find something from which to draw a little cheer.
Let us make it the latest retail sales figures. 'Retail troubles deepen', said our headline yesterday on these figures. They showed that the value of retail sales dropped by 5.3 per cent year on year in December and the volume of retail sales by 3.2 per cent.
Further along in this report, our reporter made the salient observation that retail sales form an important part of personal consumption expenditure. This, in turn, comprises about 60 per cent of our gross domestic product.
On the face of it we seem to have a pretty good leading indicator here that our Financial Secretary, Antony Leung Kam-chung, will have some bad news to impart about fourth-quarter economic growth when he makes his maiden budget speech next month.
Yes, but just how important are these retail sales figures to the overall economy? Here we get an interesting trend, as the first chart shows. Just over 20 years ago they amounted to the equivalent of almost 50 per cent of consumption expenditure. The figure now comes to less than 25 per cent.
Odd indeed. Where are we spending our spending money if not in the retail outlets? Good question, and now ask yourself another. Where did you have dinner last night? Pardon me if it was not a restaurant, but I thought that was a pretty good guess for a Friday night these days and you also may have seen a show before or afterwards.
So at least say the figures in the second chart. The blue line represents consumption spending on services. Notice that in 1981 it was less than the value of retail sales. It is now more than twice as great.
