Personal Income, Corporate Profits

Not standard NBER BCDC indicators, but still interesting. First, all measures of personal income (pretax, aftertax) are down while consumption growth slows.

Figure 1: Consumption (bold black), disposable personal income (bold blue), personal income (red), and personal income excluding current transfers (green), all in logs, 2025M01=0. Source: BEA.

Second, aftertax corporate profits with inventory valuation adjustments and capital consumption allowances are down in Q1, at -0.4% m/m vs. 5.7% consensus. That strikes me as a miss.

Figure 2: Pretax corporate profits, w/o IVA, CCA (red), and aftertax corporate profits, with IVA, CCA (blue), in 2017$. Source: BEA.

While aftertax profits are down, they are at or above trend.

In sum, real personal income is down. Corporate profits through Q1 too, but at or above trend.