Retail sales in the United States fell 1.8 percent in November, marking the fifth consecutive monthly drop, the Commerce Department reported Friday.

The November decline in retail sales followed an even bigger plunge of 2.9 percent in October and was slightly below the 1.9 percent dip that had been expected.

The weakness last month was led by a 2.8 percent decrease in auto sales. While excluding the big drop in autos, retail sales would have fallen by a smaller 1.6 percent.

Meanwhile, gasoline stations saw their sales plunge 14.7 percent last month after having dropped by 12.9 percent in October.

Sales at department stores, however, gained 2.1 percent, in contrast to a 1.2 percent decline in October. Electronics and appliance stores saw their sales increase by 2.8 percent in November, compared with a drop of 2.0 percent in the previous month.

Sales at furniture stores also edged up by 0.2 percent after having fallen by 1.0 percent in the previous month.

Total sales for the September through November period dropped by 4.5 percent from the same period a year ago.

In the United States, consumer spending accounts for two-thirds of overall economic activity and is a major force pushing the economy to expand.

The decline in retail sales for five straight months, a stretch of weakness never before seen on the government's retail sales records, was reflecting the weak economy that has been in a recession for a whole year.

Early this month, the Business Cycle Dating committee of the National Bureau of Economic Research(NBER), the U.S. panel recognized as the official arbiter of business cycles, declared that the United States entered a recession in December 2007.

The classic definition of a recession is two consecutive quarters of negative gross domestic product(GDP). The NBER, however, does not identify economic activity solely with real GDP but use a range of indicators, such as employment, personal income and industrial output, in determining the onset of recession.

Assuming that the country is still in a recession, the recession will be the longest since at least the 1981-82 recession, which lasted for 16 months.

(Xinhua News Agency December 13, 2008)