Expectations higher than realities

<p>Kia ora,</p><p>Welcome to Wednesday's Economy Watch where we follow the economic events and trends that affect New Zealand.</p><p>I'm David Chaston and this is the International edition from Interest.co.nz.</p><p>Today we lead with news we are a period of messy transition before the expected global economic growth surge arrives.</p><p>In the US, retail sales as tracked weekly by the <a href="http://www.redbookresearch.com/8702.html" target="_blank"><strong>Johnson Redbook</strong></a> are increasingly hard to judge because of the 2020 pandemic distortion. But there are no signs in 2021 that consumers have started spending their latest stimulus payments in a significant way yet. But those at the bottom of the economic ladder will start <a href="https://home.treasury.gov/news/press-releases/jy0087" target="_blank"><strong>getting their stimulus payments</strong></a> next week.</p><p>But the latest tracking of consumer confidence suggests this surge may not be far away. The <a href="https://conference-board.org/data/consumerconfidence.cfm" target="_blank"><strong>US Conference Board confidence report</strong></a> shows a sharp rise in sentiment, its highest in more than a year, with both the 'present' and 'future' indexes moving higher.</p><p>And American home-price growth in January accelerated to its highest annual rate in 15 years as the supply of homes for sale dropped to a new low. The <a href="https://www.spglobal.com/spdji/en/indices/indicators/sp-corelogic-case-shiller-us-national-home-price-nsa-index/" target="_blank"><strong>Case-Shiller National Home Price Index</strong></a> rose more than +11% in the year.</p><p>In Canada they reported <a href="https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/n1/daily-quotidien/210330/dq210330a-eng.htm?HPA=1" target="_blank"><strong>January payroll data</strong></a>, which shows the number of people in payroll employment falling, but average weekly earnings rising, and rising quite sharply (up +8.3% year-on-year). This is twisted because it is the low-paid who are losing jobs there, and