01/14/2010 - 8:30am
Retail sales in December 2009 decreased 0.3% from November to $353.0 billion, but this was 5.4% above December 2008. Total sales for the 12 months of 2009 were down %6.2 from 2008. Excluding autos, retail sales decreased 0.2% from the previous month and rose 5.2% compared to December 2008.