Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell on Wednesday underscored the Fed’s commitment to reducing unemployment to multi-decade lows, while signaling little concern about the risk of potentially high inflation or financial market instability.
Inflation for all of 2020 rose a modest 1.4%, well below the Federal Reserve’s 2% target. Analysts believe inflation will remain subdued with the U.S. economy still unable to break out of a pandemic-induced downturn.
Prices for used cars and trucks are up 10.3% in the past 12 months. The September increase in used vehicle prices was the largest monthly increase since February 1969.
The Labor Department reported Friday that the August increase in the consumer price index reflected some moderation following big gains of 0.6% in both June and July.
Behind the Fed’s new thinking is an ailing economy in the grip of a viral pandemic and a stubbornly low inflation rate that has long defied the Fed’s efforts to raise it.
Consumer prices edged up a slight 0.1 percent in September as energy prices retreated after a big gain in August.
Consumer prices rose in June from a year earlier at the fastest pace since February 2012, lifted by more expensive gas, car insurance and higher rents.
Consumer prices increased at 0.2 percent pace in February, underscoring that inflation pressures appear to be muted for now.
The chief investment strategist for Fifth Third Bank says the economy is in the seventh inning of its recovery, which is "good news." But headwinds in the labor market could be limiting the potential for growth.
The prices for nine of the 12 gifts listed in the holiday carol stayed the same or became cheaper this year, according to the 33rd annual PNC Wealth Management Christmas Price Index released Thursday.
Pay raises were a pipe dream for many Hoosiers last year—as the median wage in Indiana inched up 0.8 percent, to $31,990, according to federal data released this month.
The price of lords-a-leaping and ladies dancing has spiked this holiday season, but other items mentioned in the carol "The Twelve Days of Christmas" still cost the same as they did last year.
If you get buy all 364 items repeated throughout “The Twelve Days of Christmas” carol, you’ll pay 6.1 percent more this year, according to the so-called Christmas Price Index that PNC Wealth Management updates annually.
Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke told a local lunch crowd that he expects the economy to keep growing, but he said the growth is so slow that it could create a "permanent group" of underemployed Americans.
The Federal Reserve this week took steps to boost economic growth. But those stimulus measures are also pushing oil prices up. If gas prices follow, consumers will have less money to spend elsewhere.
The cost of a Thanksgiving dinner in the U.S. will jump 13 percent this year, the biggest gain in two decades, as prices rose for everything from turkey to green peas to milk, the American Farm Bureau Federation said.
The economy expanded at a meager 1.3-percent annual rate in the spring after scarcely growing at all in the first three months of the year, the Commerce Department said Friday. The combined growth for the first six months of the year was the weakest since the recession ended two years ago.
All economists know that, at its core, inflation is caused solely by too much money chasing too few goods.
Trying to buy the items repeated in the song’s verses would cost $96,824—10.8 percent more than last year due to rising gold prices and higher pay for nine dancing ladies.
Personal spending was unchanged in June, the Commerce Department reported Tuesday. It was the third straight month of lackluster
consumer demand. Incomes were also flat, the weakest showing in nine months.
