November 30, 2005 (The Editor’s Desk is updated each business day.)

Consumer expenditures in 2004

Average annual expenditures per consumer unit rose 6.3 percent in 2004, following increases of 0.3 percent in 2003 and 2.9 percent in 2002.

Percent change in average annual expenditures of all consumer units, 2002-04
[Chart data—TXT]

The increase in expenditures from 2003 to 2004 was more than the 2.7-percent rise in the annual average Consumer Price Index (CPI) over this period.

Changes in expenditures from 2003 to 2004 for the major components of spending were generally larger than a year earlier. Among the components, the 2004 increases for food (8.3 percent), housing (3.6 percent), apparel (10.7 percent), and healthcare (6.5 percent) were statistically significant.

These data come from the Consumer Expenditure Survey. Find out more in "Consumer Expenditures in 2004" (PDF) (TXT), news release USDL 05-2243.

Happy 10th Birthday, TED!

The very first issue of The Editor's Desk (TED) was posted on September 28, 1998. TED was the first online-only publication of the Bureau of Labor Statistics. For 10 years, BLS has been committed to posting a new TED article each business day, for a total of over 2,400 articles so far.

Find out more about the story of TED