EXPLAINER: Why US inflation is so high, and when it may ease
ABC News
Inflation is starting to look like that unexpected — and unwanted — houseguest who just won’t leave
WASHINGTON -- Inflation is starting to look like that unexpected — and unwanted — houseguest who just won’t leave.
For months, many economists had sounded a reassuring message that a spike in consumer prices, something that had been missing in action in the U.S. for a generation, wouldn’t stay long. It would prove “transitory,’’ in the soothing words of Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell and White House officials, as the economy shifted from virus-related chaos to something closer to normalcy.
Yet as any American who has bought a carton of milk, a gallon of gas or a used car could tell you, inflation has settled in. And economists are now voicing a more discouraging message: Higher prices will likely last well into next year, if not beyond.
On Friday, the government reinforced that message with its report that the consumer price index soared 6.8% last month from a year earlier — the biggest 12-month jump since 1982.
