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The Arkansas Economic Development Institute index of Arkansas retail sales dropped by 0.7% in the first quarter of 2024, while the Census Bureau reported that retail trade and food services sales for the U.S. declined by 0.2%.
Compared with a year earlier, the Arkansas measure is up by 1.2% compared with an increase of 1.4% in the U.S. measure, economist Michael Pakko reported earlier this month on his Arkansas Economist blog. Pakko noted that the sales data weren’t adjusted for inflation.
“The nominal value of total retail sales was approximately 40% higher than average spending in 2019,” he wrote.
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