By Agence France-Presse U.S. consumer confidence fell for the second straight month in September as the outlook for jobs deteriorated, the Conference Board said Sept. 28. The board's consumer confidence index fell nearly two points to 96.8, from a revised 98.7 in August, the economic research group said. The index, based on a survey of 5,000 U.S. households, was below the average forecast on Wall Street of 99.5 points. "The recent declines in the index were caused primarily by a deterioration in consumers' assessment of employment conditions," said Conference Board research director Lynn Franco. "Soft labor market conditions have clearly taken a toll on consumer confidence." Consumers' outlook for the next six months is relatively unchanged. Those anticipating conditions to worsen in the next six months increased to 9.4% from 8.8%. But those expecting business conditions to improve increased to 21.4% from 20.2% last month. Copyright Agence France-Presse, 2004
