Recent spending patterns combined with credit card losses reveal some disturbing trends.
It's no secret the U.S. economy keys off consumption. On that count, it's beginning to look less and less like an expanding economy. Whether it's the internals of the first-quarter GDP report or the source of March personal spending, the trend is not the friend of growth in coming months.
Some of it comes down to the state of U.S. workers' paychecks. Adjusted for inflation, personal income excluding government transfers peaked in December and has declined at a 3 percent annual rate over