Inflation surged in March as Iran war's energy impact hit consumers

Fox Business ^

[thegagline]

Inflation surged in March as consumer prices jumped amid the economic disruptions caused by the Iran war's impact on the energy market.

The Bureau of Labor Statistics on Friday said that the consumer price index (CPI) – a broad measure of how much everyday goods like gasoline, groceries and rent cost – rose 0.9% from a month ago and is 3.3% higher than last year. The annual figure jumped from last month's 2.4% reading, while the monthly increase also rose markedly from last month's 0.3% reading

Expectations vs. reality

Both the 0.9% monthly increase and 3.3% annual rise were in line with the expectations of economists polled by LSEG.

So-called core prices, which exclude volatile measurements of gasoline and food to better assess price growth trends, were up 0.2% on a monthly basis and 2.6% from a year ago. Both of those figures were slightly cooler than economists' predictions of 0.3% and 2.7%, respectively.

The core CPI figures were slightly hotter than February's readings, which showed prices rose 0.2% on a monthly basis and 2.5% from the prior year.

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TOPICS: Business/Economy; Government; News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: cumulative; economy; inflation; iran; war

[thegagline]

From the Bureau of Labor Statistics

[Sacajaweau]

We'll survive...Stomping on Iran is more urgent than my pocket book.

Energy is of course the big item...effecting just about everything because it includes the delivery of goods. Fertilizer is another problem. Do we have the means to produce this commodity here in the USA?

[Capn Hayek]

If you want to be an optimist, it could have been worse.

If you want to be a pessimist, I’d lay good money that the April numbers *will be* worse.

Hopefully, that will be the peak though. Once you get into summer, economic conditions tend to start baking in for a fall election. Nobody is going to be sitting around waiting for the October data (released in early November) to determine what they think about the economy/inflation/etc.

[motor_racer]

Let us not forget that the CPI does NOT include the ever-surging cost of government at all levels.

[oldtech]

Guess the average consumer will just have to wait & see how this all trickles out, but what I saw on my shopping yesterday was that some prices(like fuel) will rise & fall within a limited range, others stayed about the same as last year & some were so ridiculously high that sales in that area could be drastically affected.

[oldtech]

Guess the average consumer will just have to wait & see how this all trickles out, but what I saw on my shopping yesterday was that some prices(like fuel) will rise & fall within a limited range, others stayed about the same as last year & some were so ridiculously high that sales in that area could be drastically affected.

[thegagline]

Let us not forget that the CPI does NOT include the ever-surging cost of government at all levels.

[Kleon]

rose 0.9% from a month ago

Not much a "surge."

[Sacajaweau]

Where are the stats from the Biden years??

[Angelino97]

Biden won’t be on the ballot in November, so your question is irrelevant.

[Sacajaweau]

But a Dem is on the ballot...

[arthurus]

Fuel prices rose and associated prices rose. That is not and does not cause inflation. It causes consumers to change their buying habits and some products to be less bought. Unadjectivized inflation is and only is the borrowing of money because the government has not enough to pay for its overspending. That induces creation of more nominal money than is justified by production of goods and services. That is inflation.

If you put an adjectival prefix on to "inflation" then you are talking about something else. CPI does not measure inflation, even price (adjectival) inflation because the "basket of goods" measured by the Consumer Price Index is changed at least annually. the fastest rising prices are removed and misleading comparisons are entered such as substituting chicken for beef in the BoG on the theory that people just substitute cheaper meat for the beef that is rising faster in price.

Inflation can be measured in two ways. If the real price level average is to be kept level then it is money creation that just matches productivity growth. If the level the money supply is kept constant then prices in dollars will decline as productivity increases. That is NOT deflation and is not harmful to the economy. It scares academics because they cannot shake the ancient and erroneous thought that the value of all goods and services in the world is a constant i..e. it does not increase and a 2 or 3̀% inf;stion id the only way to grow the economy as the nominal dollars increase and that 2 or 3% accrues to the financialist class.

[Sacajaweau]

https://www.bls.gov/regions/mid-atlantic/data/consumerpriceindexhistorical_us_table.htm

[johniegrad]

Unadjectivized inflation is and only is the borrowing of money because the government has not enough to pay for its overspending. That induces creation of more nominal money than is justified by production of goods and services. That is inflation.

When I tell people this, they look at me like I’m crazy. The usual response is “I had to pay so much more for ———. That’s inflation.” Or they might say, “Trump’s tariffs are causing inflation” which is just another iteration of the same misunderstanding. They seem incapable of understanding what is a simple concept.

[Robert DeLong]

You know what, somethimes doing the right thing will bring on pains. However, allowing evil to continue to strengthen & increase, then you will also see problems of a different natue, and those problems will be even worse.

Because we have allowed Iran to keep expanding into a bigGer problem for almost 5 decades, we are now payig for THAT with inflation some inflation. But the reality is that some still alive now might see those even worse consequences, but reast asured that your children & grandchildren would absolutely see the geater problems, and their chances of overcoming them will be far harder, and the pains greater than doing it now.

President Trump needs to stop this path of negotiating with Iran. Ignore the detractors, and forge ahead and destroy them as you threatened them with previously. Talks will produce nothing President Trump. In fact, you are giving them hope with trying to go this routine

You must crush them so that they can never return to power.

[Sacajaweau]

https://www.bls.gov/regions/mid-atlantic/data/consumerpriceindexhistorical_us_table.htm

[volare737]

I kind of like the simple definition some economists use—“too much money spent chasing too few goods”, because only actual spending (not just the existence of money) pressures prices upward.

[AAABEST]

.9% month-month is around 10% annual. If not contained, 40% by the end of Trump’s term.

With his perpetual war making, massive spending and endangering the petrol dollar (among others) he’ll have nobody but himself to blame.

[Angelino97]

Yes, but voters will blame the party in power for the current economy.

They won't think "Biden HAD high inflation." They'll think "Trump HAS high inflation."

[oldplayer]

“voters will blame. . ..” Don’t you mean first, “the legacy enemedia and dimocrats will blame?”