When covering the economy at the moment, it is best to remember the old joke that if you’re not confused, it is because you’re not paying attention.
Things are truly nuts – partly because of the pandemic and partly because we are having to deal with data that is out of date because of the pandemic.
Take the latest retail trade figures that came out on Tuesday. They covered November last year – a time when life seemed to at least contain some degree of optimism.
It was a time before the Omicron wave, and before we had to put up with wall-to-wall coverage of Novac Djokovic’s spin on why he was out and about after testing positive to Covid, and before it was announced that Gal Gadot is going to star in a remake of To Catch a Thief.
Yes, things were a lot better in November.
We were back shopping and doing so at a truly insane level. But then nothing about how we have been spending money in the shops has been normal since the…
