Washington ? Shoppers and tourists kept salespeople busy, factories for the most part hummed and the jobs picture brightened during the past few months –fresh signs that the economy is moving solidly ahead.

Those were some of the developments contained in the Federal Reserve’s latest snapshot of economic activity, released Wednesday. The Fed’s survey of business conditions around the country also suggested that inflation currently wasn’t a danger to the economy.

Eleven of the Fed’s 12 regional districts characterized economic activity from late November through early January as expanding, the Fed survey said. Only the Cleveland district reported that activity in its region was mixed.

The report is dubbed the Beige Book for the color of its cover, but the signals that it sent were anything but drab. These indicators of an improving economy will be discussed when Fed policy-makers meet for the first time this year, Feb. 1-2.

Economic analysts are predicting that the Fed probably will boost a key short-term interest rate by one-quarter percentage point — to 2.50 percent — at that time.

The Fed survey said that “consumer spending increased in most districts” since its last survey released in early December. Consumer spending is important because it accounts for roughly two-thirds of all economic activity in the United States.

“Sales of luxury goods were strong in the Kansas City, Philadelphia and San Francisco districts,” the report said.