NEW YORK — Retail sales may increase as much as 4.5 percent this holiday season, exceeding last year’s gain, as improving incomes and job prospects encourage consumers to open their wallets, according to Deloitte.
Sales, excluding purchases of motor vehicles and gas, may climb to as much as $986 billion in November through January, the New York-based consulting firm said Wednesday in a statement. Holiday sales by that measure rose 2.8 percent last year, according to the company.
Shoppers are poised to increase spending as the decline in the unemployment rate to 6.1 percent makes them feel more secure in their finances. Disposable income adjusted for inflation was up 2.6 percent in the 12 months through July. Yet the slowest back-to-school sales since the recession ended in 2009 have sparked some fears that the holidays also will be sluggish and feature a return of the profit-killing discounts that hurt retailers last year.
“There’s a combination of some real reasons to be optimistic and a psychological glow of people generally feeling better about the economy,” Alison Paul, vice chairman and retail and distribution sector leader, said in an interview. Still, “it will probably be just as promotional as last year in the end.”