Retail Sales Unchanged in September as Consumers Spend More on Clothing, Food and Health Care
The August figure, unadjusted for inflation, was 0.4%, up from 0.3%.
Increases were seen mostly in the markets for food, clothes, and health and personal care products.
Mortgage rates are twice what they were a year ago due to the Federal Reserve's efforts to increase the cost of lending.
Private surveys of credit card and point of service terminal expenditure vary from government statistics.
According to Piyush Patel, chief strategy officer of Algolia, a search and discovery platform utilised by big retailers, customers are shopping sooner due to store discounts.
This week's online shopping prediction predicted 2.5% rise in 2022 holiday sales to $209.7 billion from Nov. 1 to Dec. 31.