For the last time this year, let's have another crack at busting a big myth as the predictable retail bleat reaches a Christmas crescendo: No, Santa is safe, right up there with the Easter Roo - it's the one about Australian consumers slashing their spending. Not true.

The usual suspects in the retail sector don't like facing up to that as it calls their models, management and execution into question, but the facts are there in the national accounts, never mind the monthly retail sales figures.

The punters keep spending more than they used to. The rate of growth of their spending isn't as high as it was back in our pre-GFC bubble days, but those days were dangerously unsustainable and a nonsense.