WASHINGTON, D.C. – According to the Labor Department on Tuesday, the producer price index – which tracks inflation at the wholesale level before products reach consumer retail shelves – jumped by a whopping 10.8 percent year-over-year from May 2021, spelling continued hardship for Americans and keeping overall inflation in the United States at its current 40-year high.
On a month-to-month basis, wholesale prices jumped 0.8 percent from April to May.
May’s 10.8 percent year-over-year wholesale price increase was slightly lower than the forecast 10.9 percent, and lower than the all-time record high of 11.5 percent recorded in March; nonetheless, economists say that the current still-high numbers illustrate that the economy is still likely to continue to face hardship for the foreseeable future.
However, core wholesale inflation does not include food or energy, whose prices are considered more “volatile” in comparison; the May numbers increased by 0.5 percent after going up 0.6 percent in April; the total year-over-year jump was 6.8 percent.
The biggest contributor to the overall inflation numbers was the fifth consecutive increase in the cost of goods, which was 1.4 percent in April; energy costs went up 5 percent and gasoline prices increased by 8.4 percent. Surges in the prices of transportation and warehousing services – included in the services index – crept up 0.4 percent in May.
A report released last week by the U.S. Department of Labor that the consumer price index in May rose faster than expected year-over-year at 8.4 percent, even with current economic circumstances taken into account; this is the fastest inflation has risen in the country since December 1981.
Currently, according to surveys, the average American indicates that inflation is currently the number one issue affecting the country – with many blaming President Joe Biden and the Democratic Party – and will likely be a deciding factor leading into the 2022 midterm elections in November.
Inflation is so bad at this point that that Federal Reserve has a series of large interest rate increases scheduled for June, July and September after already bumping rates up in May by a flabbergasting 50-basis points; currently, experts have branded the Fed’s attempts at lowering inflation and avoiding a recession as “ineffectual.”
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