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- Retail earnings have painted two very different pictures of how shoppers are feeling lately.
- While middle-income Americans still have money to spend, low-income shoppers are much more stressed.
- Inflation and employment could determine whether shoppers pull back even more, one analyst said.
Shoppers are being more careful with their spending than they were over the last few years as inflation bites.
But just how careful varies based on their income, and that's showing up in the latest round of retail earnings reports.