Easter always falls on a Sunday, obviously, but some people are making the argument that the holiday affected some of the economic figures that were released this week. First of all, the number of people applying for unemployment benefits rose slightly last week, in the midst of generally good job-related news. According to MarketWatch, an Obama administration official said the Easter holiday had "clouded" the data, making it difficult to interpret.
We also have a supposed Easter effect for the strong retail numbers we saw for March. Retail sales for the month were up 9.1 percent, according to sales tracker Thomson Reuters, from March of 2009. That's the largest single increase in sales since these records first were kept, in 2000. Again, Easter was credited for impacting the numbers, with the holiday falling at the very beginning of April; an economist from Moody's called it a "special factor."
Did Easter affect either of these numbers? It's possible it had some impact on retail sales, although people don't buy a whole lot for Easter beyond a baked ham and some marshmallow peeps. It's harder to see how it would affect employment, which isn't generally driven by the Easter holiday. Also, there will always be complicating factors in the economy, and no season is ever exactly like another. It wouldn't be unwise to simply take these numbers at face value.
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