Core CPI Up 3%, 25 Year High (mortgage, employment, inflation, employee)

[Oklazona Bound]

Originally Posted by RationalExpectations

Incorrect.

There is a bias in the CPI, but the bias makes the reported number a bit higher than it might be.

For example, the price of a cellular telephone, back in 1984, adjusted for inflation, was about $10,000. Over the following 15 years, the price declined rapidly as technology improved and manufacturing economies of scale took over.

At year end 1997, about 55 million cellular telephones were in use in the United States, when the price of a cellular telephone had declined to an inflation adjusted hundred dollars or less. That massive decline in prices was not captured in the CPI, however, because the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) did not begin including cellular telephones in the CPI market basket until 1998.

7000 people had cell phones in 1984. How can you count a massive drop in price of an item few owned in 1984? By the time they became affordable for the masses was when they were widely used. I remember when I was in elementary school in the 70's one classmate came in with a small LED calculator. His dad paid $300 bucks. But again I don't this being a real price decline since few bought the $300 ones back in the day.

[Taggerung]

Originally Posted by tickyul

AND...........do you think Fedgov is going to raise rates because CPI goes up?????

NOPE, they will stay near zero for longer than they kept them that way during
the "great recession", ten years or so.

The debts are now so enormous that we genuinely cannot afford interest rates much higher than zero.

[PamelaIamela]

Originally Posted by SWFL_Native

The CPI is notoriously a faulty measure of inflation... For the majority of the population it considerably underweights the impact of housing (mortgage/tax/rents) and over-indexes consumer goods (groceries/services).

It underweights big ticket, service heavy and higher end products.. you know, the kind most of us need and/or want to buy.

[Lycanmaster]

That's not even taking into account "shrinkflation", where companies especially in the food industry decrease the amount of content but keep the prices the same.

[mathjak107]

Originally Posted by PamelaIamela

It underweights big ticket, service heavy and higher end products.. you know, the kind most of us need and/or want to buy.

The CPI only looks at price changes throughout our 1500 mini economies .. it was never meant to match anyone’s personal cost of living.

A cost of living index would be unique to what you buy x how many times you buy it x some quality factor since higher end good see bigger price increases but also tend to last longer.

The CPI tracks way to many goods and services that have no bearing on our own purchases.

Here in nyc rents have come down 21% on average , for millions in stabilized housing which is more than half our rentals there was no increase this year and likely none next year


That means nothing to an area where rents are soaring yet it is a big component in the CPI .

[lchoro]

Janet Yellen says the inflation rate was actually 3.4 percent since 2010
She's calling for larger budgets since the budget hasn't kept up with inflation since 2010.

Yellen calls for more aggressive spending

That's closer to the historical real rate that I've stated in the past. It's between 3.5 and 4.5 percent. This year, it's probably closer to 6.5 to 8.5 percent. The big bulge in real estate costs add about 3.2 percentage points.

[Avondalist]

Originally Posted by lchoro

Janet Yellen says the inflation rate was actually 3.4 percent since 2010
She's calling for larger budgets since the budget hasn't kept up with inflation since 2010.

Yellen calls for more aggressive spending

That's closer to the historical real rate that I've stated in the past. It's between 3.5 and 4.5 percent. This year, it's probably closer to 6.5 to 8.5 percent. The big bulge in real estate costs add about 3.2 percentage points.

I'm waiting for the end of the eviction moratoriums to see what happens to the rental part of CPI.

[EDS_]

Originally Posted by lchoro

Janet Yellen says the inflation rate was actually 3.4 percent since 2010
She's calling for larger budgets since the budget hasn't kept up with inflation since 2010.

Yellen calls for more aggressive spending

That's closer to the historical real rate that I've stated in the past. It's between 3.5 and 4.5 percent. This year, it's probably closer to 6.5 to 8.5 percent. The big bulge in real estate costs add about 3.2 percentage points.

Listen you don't get to make the rules. Every important economy on Earth either does not account for RE at all or discounts RE costs, via low to very low weighting, within consumer price indexes.


And you can't have it both ways you are either worried about inflation, which you seem to be crowing about regularly or you are not and you want more stimulative spending? Which is it?


If Yellen wants larger budgets, more spending and specially more stimulative spending how does that go to control inflationary pressures? I think JY has talked herself into an important logic trap.

[Tencent]

Originally Posted by RationalExpectations

The statisticians and economists at BLS do a remarkable job - but the phenomenon I describe is a matter of policy, not statistics.

Yeah like how they exclude those who no longer receive UE

[EDS_]

Originally Posted by Tencent

Yeah like how they exclude those who no longer receive UE

That's incorrect as well. I'd suggest you study up on U1 through U6, not just U3, and note that LFPR numbers are updated regularly as well.



https://www.bls.gov/lau/stalt.htm

https://www.bls.gov/charts/employmen...ation-rate.htm