News Release

EMBARGOED UNTIL RELEASE AT 8:30 A.M. EDT, FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 27, 2019
BEA 19-48

Personal Income and Outlays, August 2019

Personal income increased $73.5 billion (0.4 percent) in August according to estimates released today by the Bureau of Economic Analysis. Disposable personal income (DPI) increased $77.7 billion (0.5 percent) and personal consumption expenditures (PCE) increased $20.1 billion (0.1 percent).

Real DPI increased 0.4 percent in August and Real PCE increased 0.1 percent. The PCE price index increased less than 0.1 percent. Excluding food and energy, the PCE price index increased 0.1 percent.

  2019
Apr. May Jun. Jul. Aug.
Percent change from preceding month
Personal income:  
     Current dollars 0.4 0.4 0.4 0.1 0.4
Disposable personal income:  
     Current dollars 0.4 0.3 0.4 0.3 0.5
     Chained (2012) dollars 0.1 0.2 0.3 0.0 0.4
Personal consumption expenditures (PCE):  
     Current dollars 0.7 0.4 0.3 0.5 0.1
     Chained (2012) dollars 0.4 0.3 0.2 0.3 0.1
Price indexes:  
     PCE 0.3 0.1 0.1 0.2 0.0
     PCE, excluding food and energy 0.2 0.1 0.3 0.2 0.1
Price indexes: Percent change from month one year ago
     PCE 1.5 1.4 1.4 1.4 1.4
     PCE, excluding food and energy 1.6 1.5 1.6 1.7 1.8

The $73.5 billion increase in personal income in August primarily reflected increases in wages and salaries, nonfarm proprietors’ income, and personal current transfer receipts that were partially offset by a decrease in personal interest income (table 3).

The $13.9 billion increase in real PCE in August reflected an increase of $18.0 billion in spending for goods and a $1.6 billion decrease in spending for services (table 7). Within goods, recreational goods and vehicles was the leading contributor to the increase. Within services, the largest contributor to the decrease was spending for food services and accommodations. Detailed information on monthly real PCE spending can be found on Table 2.3.6U.

Personal outlays increased $22.3 billion in August (table 3). Personal saving was $1.35 trillion in August and the personal saving rate, personal saving as a percentage of disposable personal income, was 8.1 percent (table 1).

Updates to Personal Income and Outlays

Estimates have been updated for April through July. The percent change from the preceding month for current-dollar personal income, and for current-dollar and chained (2012) dollar DPI and PCE -- revised and as published in last month's release -- are shown below.

  Change from preceding month
June July
Previous Revised Previous Revised Previous Revised Previous Revised
(Billions of dollars) (Percent) (Billions of dollars) (Percent)
Personal income:  
     Current dollars 83.8 81.6 0.5 0.4 23.9 23.6 0.1 0.1
Disposable personal income:  
     Current dollars 69.7 67.6 0.4 0.4 44.4 42.0 0.3 0.3
     Chained (2012) dollars 45.9 42.4 0.3 0.3 8.9 2.6 0.1 0.0
Personal consumption expenditures:  
     Current dollars 50.3 48.9 0.3 0.3 93.1 72.7 0.6 0.5
     Chained (2012) dollars 30.2 27.5 0.2 0.2 56.9 34.6 0.4 0.3

Next release: October 31, 2019 at 8:30 A.M. EDT
Personal Income and Outlays: September 2019