Posted on 01/15/2015 9:39:57 PM PST by blam
Myles Udland
January 15, 2015
The crash in oil prices might be good for consumers, but it's terrible for inflation data.
The US Bureau of Labor Statistics is set to release the consumer price index on Friday morning at 8:30 ET. The index is a measure of consumer prices, and the most popularly cited measure of inflation.
Expectations are for headline inflation to fall 0.4% in December compared to the prior month, which would be the largest month-on-month decline since December 2008.
Compared to last year, headline inflation is set to rise 0.7%.
"Core" inflation which strips out the cost of food and energy and is the number more closely watched by economists is expected to rise 0.1% in December and 1.7% when compared to last year.
Most of this decline in inflation is expected to be a result of the drop in oil prices, which has in turn sent gas prices to multiyear lows.
In a note to clients ahead of the report, Brian Jones at Societe Generale wrote that, "Reflecting a projected 12.1% dive in seasonally adjusted gasoline pump prices, the CPI energy cost gauge likely fell by 5.4%, shaving one-half percentage point off the headline measure last month."
And so decline in gas prices will be responsible for all of the decline in the headline index come Friday morning.
(snip)
(Excerpt) Read more at businessinsider.com ...
You are competing with 50 million people getting free food stamps (EBT cards). A family of 4 gets around $800 a month in free food stamps. There is no free lunch. Someone else has to pay for the free lunch.
The big food companies like General Foods, Kraft etc. spend huge amounts of money lobbying the DC politicans to boost their profits via food stamps.
At least Tina Turner had the good sense to bail out and become a citizen of Switzerland.
And those extracting leaching living lavishly excess party DC ers, celebrating false value are stealers thiefs. And they are hiding under cover as if they are providing value, and actually are stealing, and extorters. Prague 1968
I have a very economical car that I don’t drive very much, so the lower gas price hasn’t really changed anything for me, but I do notice you can easily fit $100 worth of food in a mini-cart.
Yes, me too.
Oh, deer!
I’ve always preferred deflation because prices can never go lower than zero. Inflation never reaches a ceiling.
Because the food we are eating now was raised and shipped to be canned or frozen last season when fertilizer and fuel prices were high, and of course the livestock grew up in a high cost period too, so meat prices will still reflect high feed costs from the last couple of years.
Venison economics.
The good number is zero. That should be the Fed’s sole and only goal. Let the market sort it out from there.
I filled up and was shocked when the nozel popped off full at $28.
A moose bit my sister once...
CC
For Keynesians.
If at all.
Not the all time low labor participation rate? Not the plethora of regulations that are shutting down whole industries that cannot meet standards for which the technology does not exist?
Blame what you will, but I think you just might be missing a few things.
Unfortunately, the only hope for the US economy is a massive war between India and Red China...
You can thank Slick Willie for changing the rules for computing the inflation index beginning in 1992. It’s been a fraud ever since.
So energy costs are only counted in CPI when they decline? Right, got it.
A decline in the rate of inflation is the worst inflation, and it’s due to falling retail gasoline prices which aren’t tracked in the core inflation metrics? Got it, lol.
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