Greater Than Expectations: End of Year Edition

A collection of pretty darned good news from the pre- and post-holiday wires:

Holiday Spending

The 8.7% increase over 2004 exceeded the National Retail Federation’s expected increase of 6%. Even if you figure that 2005’s holiday period had one more shopping day, that’s a very impressive increase.

Consumer Confidence

It came in at 91.5; Wall Street had expected 89.0.

Corporate Profits

Biz Weak reports (Item 4 at link):

Profits in 2005 were surprisingly strong, even outside of energy. Through the third quarter, earnings growth for the Standard & Poor’s 500 companies beat expectations for the 10th quarter in a row, according to Thomson Financial.

As I’ve noted before, naysayers are in the early stages of Plan B (grudgingly acknowledge the pervasive good news, look for the first signs of a crack, then wishfully, and probably falsely, pronounce the end of the good times), and are laying the foundation for Plan C (denounce “greed” and “materialism” as if it all of a sudden has become a new element of the human condition) as the steady-enough economic growth continues.
______________________________

UPDATE: Paul at Wizbang has a more comprehensive list of good news, and examples of media reports that seem reluctant to acknowledge the obvious. He also makes an excellent point that gift cards aren’t recorded as sales until they are used. This means that the record purchases of gift cards that took place during the Christmas shopping season will causes increases in future months’ retail sales.

UPDATE 2, Dec. 28: From a Wall Street Journal editorial (requires subscription): “Come January, the politicians will return to convince us that things are terrible, but for now, it looks like no one’s buying what they’re selling.”