On the surface, the holiday retail season is off to a great start. Almost 200 million U.S. shoppers turned out in person and online from Thanksgiving Day to Cyber Monday, and holiday retail sales are expected to rise between 6% and 8% from last year to nearly a trillion dollars. Amazon reported its most successful launch of a holiday shopping season ever.
It’s enough to make you think COVID-19 and the hard times that went along with it have disappeared for good, especially as the labor market remains tight, still pushing up wages.
Recession? What recession?
