Consumer spending in the U.S. had a record decline for half a century.

U.S. consumer spending in December 2008 reduced the percentage that was the worst level since 1961. Reported Bloomberg referring to data the U.S. Department of Commerce. A month earlier decline in consumer spending was 0.8 percent.
At the end of the fourth quarter of 2008, spending declined by 8.9 per cent, which was the worst level since 1947, when the beginning of recorded statistics. Contributed to reducing the rise in unemployment. A total of last year's work lost 2,6 million Americans.
Earlier it was reported that the U.S. economy declined in the last quarter of 2008 to 3,8 percent in annual terms. The decline in GDP was the largest since 1982. At the end of last year, U.S. GDP grew by 1.3 per cent due to rise in the first half. In December last year, the National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER) announced that the U.S. economy entered into recession in December 2007.