Headline Roundup • January 11th, 2024
Inflation Grew to 3.4% in December
Summary from the AllSides News Team
According to the U.S. Department of Labor, the annual inflation rate rose to 3.4% in December, up from 3.1% the previous month.
Key Details: The Bureau of Labor Statistics reported that the monthly Consumer Price Index (CPI) rose 0.3% in December, after rising 0.1% in November. Increased housing costs contributed to more than half of the increase in December.
Key Quote: “The progress on inflation since June 2022 has been remarkable,” said David Kelly, chief global strategist at J.P. Morgan Asset Management. “The bottom line is that the most likely path for inflation from here is not upwards or sideways but rather down.”
For Context: Based on the Labor Department's report, the Federal Reserve is not expected to change the interest rate at their next meeting on January 30-31. Cooling price increases over the past year increased hopes that inflation can be tamed without a recession or a surge in unemployment, and interest cuts might occur in early 2024 if inflation rates remain mild.
How the Media Covered it: Sources on the left noted that consumers are still getting used to everyday prices that are higher than pre-pandemic levels. Sources on the right noted that prices in December rose faster than the 2% target that the Federal Reserve was hoping for in a healthy economy.
Featured Coverage of this Story
PHOTO: ASH PONDERS/BLOOMBERG NEWS
Inflation picked up to 3.4% in December, after a rapid cooling through most of 2023.
Economists surveyed by The Wall Street Journal estimated consumer prices overall rose 0.2% in December from the prior month and increased 3.2% from a year earlier. That compares with November’s 0.1% monthly gain and marks a small acceleration from that month’s 3.1% annual increase.
Core prices, which strip out volatile food and energy items, climbed 0.3% in December from the prior month, while rising 3.8% from a year earlier, economists estimated. That would be the same...
Robert Nickelsberg / Getty Images
Inflation climbed from 3.1% to 3.4% in December, a sign the Federal Reserve will continue to have to wrestle consumer price growth down to its desired 2% level.
Forecasts had been for a reading of 3.2%.
On a monthly basis, inflation hit 0.3%, while core inflation, which strips away the more volatile costs of food and energy, was 3.9%, down from 4% in November but ahead of forecasts for a reading of 3.8%.
Still, some consumers are starting to feel better about the economy, even though, to many of them,...
Al Drago/Bloomberg via Getty Images
Inflation accelerated more than December, marking the thirty-third consecutive month with annual prices rising significantly faster than the two percent target seen as healthy by the Federal Reserve.
The consumer-price index, the Labor Department’s broad measurement of what consumers pay for goods and services, rose 3.4 in December from a year earlier.
Economists were expecting a year-0ver-year increase of 3.2 percent. The 12-month gain was 3.1 percent in November.
Compared with the prior month, the CPI was up 0.3 percent, an acceleration from the gain of 0.2 percent in November...
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