News Release

These data have been superseded. Please see our latest releases for current estimates and contact information.

Explore Product View

EMBARGOED UNTIL RELEASE AT 8:30 A.M. EST, Friday, January 28, 2022

BEA 22–03

Personal Income and Outlays, December 2021

Personal income increased $70.7 billion (0.3 percent) in December according to estimates released today by the Bureau of Economic Analysis (tables 3 and 5). Disposable personal income (DPI) increased $39.9 billion (0.2 percent) and personal consumption expenditures (PCE) decreased $95.2 billion (0.6 percent).

Real DPI decreased 0.2 percent in December and Real PCE decreased 1.0 percent; goods decreased 3.1 percent and services increased 0.1 percent (tables 5 and 7). The PCE price index increased 0.4 percent. Excluding food and energy, the PCE price index increased 0.5 percent (table 9).

	2021
	Aug.	Sept.	Oct.	Nov.	Dec.
	Percent change from preceding month
Personal income:
Current dollars	0.3	-1.0	0.6	0.5	0.3
Disposable personal income:
Current dollars	0.3	-1.3	0.5	0.4	0.2
Chained (2012) dollars	-0.1	-1.6	-0.2	-0.2	-0.2
Personal consumption expenditures (PCE):
Current dollars	1.1	0.6	1.5	0.4	-0.6
Chained (2012) dollars	0.7	0.3	0.9	-0.2	-1.0
Price indexes:
PCE	0.4	0.3	0.6	0.6	0.4
PCE, excluding food and energy	0.3	0.2	0.4	0.5	0.5
Price indexes:	Percent change from month one year ago
PCE	4.2	4.4	5.1	5.7	5.8
PCE, excluding food and energy	3.6	3.7	4.2	4.7	4.9

COVID-19 Impact on December 2021 Personal Income and Outlays

The estimate for December personal income and outlays reflected the continued economic recovery and government response to the COVID-19 pandemic. In December, COVID-19 cases resulted in continued restrictions and disruptions in the operations of establishments in some parts of the country. Government social benefits decreased, primarily reflecting the winding down of pandemic-related assistance programs. The full economic effects of the COVID-19 pandemic cannot be quantified in the personal income and outlays estimate because the impacts are generally embedded in source data and cannot be separately identified. For more information, see Effects of Selected Federal Pandemic Response Programs on Personal Income.

The increase in personal income in December primarily reflected an increase in compensation that was partly offset by a decrease in proprietors' income. Within compensation, the increase reflected increases in both private and government wages and salaries. Within proprietors' income, both nonfarm and farm income decreased (table 3). Government social benefits decreased slightly, reflecting the winding down of pandemic-related assistance programs.

The $95.2 billion decrease in current-dollar PCE in December reflected a decrease of $147.2 billion in spending for goods that was partly offset by a $52.0 billion increase in spending for services (table 3). Within goods, decreases were widespread across most components and were led by recreational goods and vehicles, "other" nondurable goods (which includes newspapers, household supplies, and games and toys), and furnishings and durable household equipment. Within services, the largest contributor to the increase was spending for health care. Detailed information on monthly PCE spending can be found on Table 2.3.5U.

Personal outlays decreased $93.5 billion in December (table 3). Personal saving was $1.44 trillion in December and the personal saving rate—personal saving as a percentage of disposable personal income—was 7.9 percent (table 1).

The PCE price index for December increased 5.8 percent from one year ago, reflecting increases in both goods and services (table 11). Energy prices increased 29.9 percent while food prices increased 5.7 percent. Excluding food and energy, the PCE price index for December increased 4.9 percent from one year ago.

Updates to Personal Income and Outlays

Estimates have been updated for October and November. Revised and previously published changes from the preceding month for current-dollar personal income, and for current-dollar and chained (2012) dollar DPI and PCE, are provided below.

	Change from preceding month
	October				November
	Previous	Revised	Previous	Revised	Previous	Revised	Previous	Revised
	(Billions of dollars)		(Percent)		(Billions of dollars)		(Percent)
Personal income:
Current dollars	93.2	124.3	0.5	0.6	90.4	107.5	0.4	0.5
Disposable personal income:
Current dollars	63.3	87.7	0.4	0.5	70.4	78.2	0.4	0.4
Chained (2012) dollars	-50.3	-25.4	-0.3	-0.2	-33.8	-30.1	-0.2	-0.2
Personal consumption expenditures:
Current dollars	229.7	246.8	1.4	1.5	104.7	65.8	0.6	0.4
Chained (2012) dollars	102.5	120.9	0.7	0.9	4.4	-31.1	0.0	-0.2

Annual Update of the National Economic Accounts

BEA will release results from the 2022 annual update of the National Economic Accounts, which includes the National Income and Product Accounts as well as the Industry Economic Accounts, on September 29, 2022. This update will present revised statistics for GDP, GDP by Industry, and gross domestic income and will cover the first quarter of 2017 through the first quarter of 2022. More information on the 2022 annual update will be included on BEA’s website as well as in a forthcoming Survey of Current Business article, “GDP and the Economy.”

* * *

Next release: February 25, 2022 at 8:30 A.M. EST
Personal Income and Outlays, January 2022

* * *

Personal Income and Outlays Release Dates for 2022
Estimate	Release Date
December 2021	January 28, 2022
January 2022	February 25, 2022
February 2022	March 31, 2022
March 2022	April 29, 2022
April 2022	May 27, 2022
May 2022	June 30, 2022
June 2022	July 29, 2022
July 2022	August 26, 2022
August 2022	September 30, 2022
September 2022	October 28, 2022
October 2022	December 1, 2022
November 2022	December 23, 2022

Full Release & Tables (PDF)

Tables Only (Excel)

Release Highlights (PDF)

Historical Comparisons (PDF)

Effects of Selected Federal Pandemic Response Programs on Personal Income (PDF)

Effects of Selected Federal Pandemic Response Programs on Personal Income (Excel)

Personal Income

Karl Rohrer

(301) 278-9083

piniwd@bea.gov

PCE Goods

Kyle Brown

301-278-9086

pce@bea.gov

PCE Services

Jeff Barnett

301-278-9663

pce@bea.gov

News Media

Jeannine Aversa

(301) 278-9003

Jeannine.Aversa@bea.gov

Resources

Additional Resources available at www.bea.gov:

Information on COVID-19 and recovery impacts is available on our website.
Stay informed about BEA developments by reading The BEA Wire, signing up for BEA's email subscription service, or following BEA on Twitter @BEA_News.
Historical time series for these estimates can be accessed in BEA's Interactive Data Application.
Access BEA data by registering for BEA's Data Application Programming Interface (API).
For more on BEA's statistics, refer to our monthly online journal, the Survey of Current Business.
BEA's news release schedule
NIPA Handbook: Concepts and Methods of the U.S. National Income and Product Accounts

Definitions

Personal income is the income received by, or on behalf of, all persons from all sources: from participation as laborers in production, from owning a home or business, from the ownership of financial assets, and from government and business in the form of transfers. It includes income from domestic sources as well as the rest of world. It does not include realized or unrealized capital gains or losses.

Disposable personal income is the income available to persons for spending or saving. It is equal to personal income less personal current taxes.

Personal consumption expenditures (PCE) is the value of the goods and services purchased by, or on the behalf of, "persons" who reside in the United States.

Personal outlays is the sum of PCE, personal interest payments, and personal current transfer payments.

Personal saving is personal income less personal outlays and personal current taxes.

The personal saving rate is personal saving as a percentage of disposable personal income.

Current-dollar estimates are valued in the prices of the period when the transactions occurred—that is, at "market value." Also referred to as "nominal estimates" or as "current-price estimates."

Real values are inflation-adjusted estimates—that is, estimates that exclude the effects of price changes.

For more definitions, refer to the Glossary: National Income and Product Accounts.

Statistical conventions

Annual rates. Monthly and quarterly values are expressed at seasonally-adjusted annual rates (SAAR). Dollar changes are calculated as the difference between these SAAR values. For detail, refer to the FAQ "Why does BEA publish estimates at annual rates?"

Month-to-month percent changes are calculated from unrounded data and are not annualized.

Quarter-to-quarter percent changes are calculated from unrounded data and are displayed at annual rates. For detail, refer to the FAQ "How is average annual growth calculated?" and "Why does BEA publish percent changes in quarterly series at annual rates?"

Quantities and prices. Quantities, or "real" volume measures, and prices are expressed as index numbers with a specified reference year equal to 100 (currently 2012). Quantity and price indexes are calculated using a Fisherchained weighted formula that incorporates weights from two adjacent periods (months for monthly data, quarters for quarterly data and annuals for annual data). For details on the calculation of quantity and price indexes, refer to Chapter 4: Estimating Methods in the NIPA Handbook.

Chained-dollar values are calculated by multiplying the quantity index by the current dollar value in the reference year (2012) and then dividing by 100. Percent changes calculated from real quantity indexes and chained-dollar levels are conceptually the same; any differences are due to rounding. Chained-dollar values are not additive because the relative weights for a given period differ from those of the reference year. In tables that display chained-dollar values, a "residual" line shows the difference between the sum of detailed chained-dollar series and its corresponding aggregate.