http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-18171600 Is it just me or is this article confusing correlation and causation? Yes it appears that both petrol sales and retail sales were low in April. But to say that one caused the other without justification seems like pretty weak to me. I would have said that the petrol sales were lower because everyone filled up their tanks and jerry cans in March then had enough to make it through most of April without refueling. The heavy rain every day in April seems more likely the cause of retail sale slumps. The centre of town is totally rammed this week compared to a very damp day three weeks ago when there was hardly a soul. Which is even what the guy they interviewed suggested!
Ah no the first paragraph of the article explains it Retail sales includes Petrol sales as part of its total, therefore as fuel sales in april went down by 13.2% it dragged the overal retail sales figure down. If you strip out the loss due to petrol it was still a 1% drop caused by the rain and reluctance to spend, with a lot of that being the clothes area of retail.
