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You may be right, October retail sales growth was weaker and something like 2.6% growth (just under the 3.2% inflation) as described in articles linked by the posted article. Forecasts are for all holiday spending to reach record levels this year beyond just what inflation would suggest. When the year finishes there will be more concrete data beyond just black Friday to find out for sure.
I think doom spending is a reasonable idea.
I think another piece is increasing wages. Those increased on average year over year in October by 5.2%. So many people probably feel individually they can afford the increased prices and buy even more on top. Though if you're in an industry or situation where you haven't been able to leverage the high labor demand and low unemployment for increased wages like most across the entire economy have been able to, you're probably hurting.
I think, if the data is granular enough, you could see it in what people were buying. Of half the sales were in DVDs and grown-up-toys, then yeah, it’s doom spending.
But I doubt anyone whose pay check to pay check or even remotely close just went out and drop loads of cash on things that weren’t either vaguely needed or budgeted into savings.
Outside of Black Friday, spending increases are accounted for by increase in food and energy inflation- not to mention the cost of debt- especially revolving debt.
Also consider, that the 5% gains you cite probably include people that don’t really need them. The rest of us see a net loss compared to inflation- maybe not yoy, but compared to the last three years certainly. Rememebe the whole point raising interest is to both reduce demand and reduce increases in pay. (After all, it’s all the consumer’s fault and not at all greedy corporations fixing the prices of eggs… which are pretty much used in every kitchen.)
This year no toys for me- rather it was very much needed appliances.
"the rest of us see a net loss compared to inflation"
The data suggests most people have not seen a net loss compared to inflation. Agreed you would need more granular data to know for sure, in case the mean was too influenced by outliers. So I looked up median too which are seeing similar rates of wage growth. So no that doesn't appear to be the case. Most people are not seeing a net loss compared to inflation. If you back up to three years ago, when we had a period of rapidly lowering inflation as the entire economy shut down, oil was literally being given away, and people were getting additional checks and tax credits in the mail, then yes you're right, real wages still lag about three percent. If you compare to four years ago, December, 2019, a more normal economic situation just before the pandemic, then wages have fully compensated for inflation in comparison to then.
https://www.bls.gov/opub/ted/2023/median-weekly-earnings-increased-5-7-percent-over-the-year-ending-in-the-second-quarter-of-2023.htm?mf_ct_campaign=yahoo-synd-feed
Real wages 2019 December https://stats.bls.gov/news.release/archives/realer_01142020.pdf
Real wages October 2023 https://www.bls.gov/news.release/pdf/realer.pdf
Things should also continue to get better, as wage growth has been outpacing inflation again since January 2023.
https://www.statista.com/statistics/1351276/wage-growth-vs-inflation-us/
You also mention well maybe low wage workers aren't getting the increase. It's actually the opposite, lower wage earners have seen more of the wage increase.
https://www.epi.org/publication/swa-wages-2022/