May 21, 2002 (The Editor’s Desk is updated each business day.)
Clothing prices down again in 2001
Prices paid by consumers for apparel fell 3.2 percent in 2001. This was the largest annual decline since 1952. Last year’s drop followed a decrease of 1.8 percent in 2000.
![Annual change in the Consumer Price Index for apparel, 1991-2001](https://webarchive.library.unt.edu/web/20120925081438im_/http://www.bls.gov/opub/ted/images/2002/may/wk3/art02.gif) [Chart data—TXT]
Both apparel sales volumes and consumer confidence declined in 2000 and 2001. Demand for apparel was down during this period, especially at department stores and specialty clothing stores. Last year, even discount clothiers sold fewer clothes than normal.
These data are produced by the BLS Consumer
Price Index program. For additional information on consumer price
changes in 2001, see "Consumer
inflation lower in 2001: energy and apparel prices declined," by
Todd Wilson, Monthly Labor Review, March 2002. Annual percent
changes are December-to-December changes.
Of interest
Spotlight on Statistics: National Hispanic Heritage Month
In this Spotlight, we take a look at the Hispanic labor force—including labor force participation, employment and unemployment, educational attainment, geographic location, country of birth, earnings, consumer expenditures, time use, workplace injuries, and employment projections.
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