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mpc: 17 On the other hand, there were plausible explanations for an increase in household saving ratios and hence a consumption slowdown. As in March, the Committee had discussed three such explanations. First, the fall in house price inflation might have had a bigger impact on consumption growth than expected; the Committee might have underestimated the strength of this link. Second, the increase in official interest rates up to last August might now be having a larger-than-anticipated effect on spending. It was difficult to assess precisely what the consequences for spending would be of historically high aggregate household debt, not least because its distribution across different types of household mattered. Third, households might have been becoming more concerned about the adequacy of their arrangements for income in retirement, although it was not clear why that would have led to a sharp rise in saving at this particular time. At present, it was not easy to distinguish among these three hypotheses or quantify their implications.