Plus, track precipitation extremes in the USAFacts climate tool

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** How the pandemic changed American saving
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Government support like stimulus checks and expanded unemployment insurance have kept overall American income elevated throughout the pandemic's economic uncertainty. But many Americans, including those who received government support, mostly saved instead of spent in 2020.

So, where have (and haven’t) people been spending their money? USAFacts has the metrics ([link removed]) on how US spending and saving have fluctuated during nearly two years of this pandemic.
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* While overall income returned to pre-pandemic levels by April 2020, household spending didn't hit pre-pandemic levels until this past March.

* August spending on restaurants and hotels was 0.79% below January 2020 levels. Meanwhile, spending on travel abroad increased 38%, the most since January 2020. The second-largest increase was in apparel spending: 19.79%.

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* Americans saved an average of 6% to 7% of their overall income each month before the pandemic. The saving rate has averaged 15.3% since the pandemic began, with spikes in the months when people received stimulus checks or unemployment insurance.

* While the higher saving rate is true for America in aggregate, it does not speak to the experiences of individual families. According to the Census Bureau’s Household Pulse Survey, in mid-September, 27.6% of adults lived in households where it has been somewhat or very difficult to pay for usual household expenses.

Are you spending more now than earlier in the pandemic? See how your household spending stacks up against national trends in this report ([link removed]) .

Is all this rain normal?

This past weekend, the Western United States faced what meteorologists called a “bomb cyclone” with high winds and an abundance of precipitation — and the potential for more coming this week.
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Use the USAFacts climate tool ([link removed]) to track historic rainfall trends from California to Washington (and beyond) to see what’s normal or considered extreme weather, all powered by data from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

One last fact
Oil prices are at seven-year highs. As the economy rebounds from the COVID-19 pandemic, gas prices continue to increase as well.

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