Americans Buy New Fridges. Economy Is Saved!

Americans, God bless us, love buying stuff. After a brief fit of saving and general personal restraint, it looks like we might be jumping back in and making major purchases. Real GDP may be down 5.7 percent in the first quarter, but gosh darn it, we can only wait so longer before our (foreign-made) durable good stop…durring:

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – An unexpected jump in U.S. durable goods orders last month backed hopes that the economy was healing, but news from the hard-hit housing market remained mixed.

As David Weinberger put it "In case you were wondering how long Americans could put off buying that new fridge, we now have the answer: About ten months."

Yesterday, The Washington Post ran a story about how Americans were still holding their spending in check, reminding us yet again how hard it is to read the recovery tea leaves. Let's hope Obama means it when he says we're going to hold off on Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi's (D-Calif.) fondly hoped-for Stimulus: The Revenge.