Inflation falls to 2.4%, lowest in three years

I started eating salads in August. I eat the packaged ones from King Soopers.

They’ve gone from $2.99 to $3.69 in that time. Since August.

I don’t believe anyone who says inflation is 2.4%. I just don’t believe it.

Packaged salads have an insane markup on them, if you do them yoursef you can save more than inflation ;)
The trick with inflation calculations is that they're tied to a specific basket of wholesale goods. So each individual ingredient in that bagged salad may not have gone up more than 2.4%. But the grocery store's corporate accountants have decided they can increase their margins with a 23% price hike.

That's not inflation, it's greedflation. And while we see wholesale prices remain low, we're watching profits soar.
- This is Core Inflation in the OP. It’s actually a basket of baskets of goods.
Inflation tracks the value of currency. Grocery store prices track how much corporations can charge you, imagine how bad it would be if the Krogers Albertson Merger wasn't stopped by the Biden Administration.
- The value of currency is always relative to goods and services.
  
  Prices track the value of currency.

Oh that's wonderful, because as we all know inflation is the only reason for the increasing prices...right? There couldn't be any other contributing factors?

While this is good news, remember that this means that prices are still increasing due to inflation, just at a slower rate now. It does NOT mean that inflation has been reversed.

Not sure why there are down votes here. It's an important fact to remember that inflation "falling" doesn't mean the cost of living is going down.

Whether reversing inflation is good or not isn't their point. The point is, living is still more expensive than last year and your wage hasn't been keeping up since the 70s.
- Probably because most people are too lazy to explain that deflation is a bad thing and incredibly hard to get unstuck. The "ideal" scenario is one where inflation stays low and wages outpace it. A small amount of inflation is a way to stop billionaires from sitting on piles of cash. At least with inflation they're incentivized to spend it on investments, some of which are good for the economy.

If only we could get -2% inflation for a few years so price come down to reasonable levels.

This is why I come to Lemmy — for people with even a passing understanding of the topics on which they speak confidently.

Not in russia lol!

I saw this when I opened Edge for work this morning. Two worlds in one picture.

Someone is lying and I have a sneaking suspicion of who it is.
A/B headline testing in action.

Which one will get you to click through to the ads?

Really glad the president of the USA finally decided to pull the lower inflation lever in the oval office.

It's a knob, dumbass
- My apologies
  
  Really glad the ~~president~~ knob of the USA finally decided to pull the lower inflation lever in the oval office.
- It's right next to the gas price slider. Duh.
I look forward to all the Biden "I did this!" stickers lauding his administration for lowering inflation.
- Lower inflation doesn't mean lower prices - which we need, and/or higher wages - it means prices are going up a little more slowly. Pointing at a $9 jar of mayonnaise with an "I did this" isn't going to win many people over.
- Can just reuse all the ones MAGAts stuck on gas pumps.
It's right next to the Gas Price Dial on the Resolute desk.

Now pay me more and we're good.

Why are you asking Lemmy? Wage growth has been outpacing inflation. You should be getting on that train yourself if you want it.
- I'm a teacher. Don't come at me with that.

Food prices are still up twenty to forty percent.

Right! and now, amazing news! Our expenses are only growing at a rate of only 2.4%!! Hooray?!?
- 2% is actually pretty good and about what you want. Maintaining flat spending power sounds great on paper, but also puts an economy at increased risk of recession and citizens at increased risk of ballooning debt.

That's great the prices aren't going up more. Now go get all of these companies that are price gouging. It's good to protect people from it during natural disasters but unfortunate the government didn't consider COVID a natural disaster.

Oh they are still going up, just not as much.

That's still 2.4% on top of the cumulated inflation of the past 5 years...

The economy would tank really hard if wet somehow deflated it to go back in time. It doesn't work like that.

Plus the last 5 years was almost entirely from covid anyway
- I'm not saying it should. I'm just saying the rest of us still can't keep up even with 2% because of the cumulative two digits inflation we've had over the past few years on top of it.
That's just how inflation works though. Wages tend to rise slower than prices do. In economic terms, wages are "sticky." They rise and fall slower than prices do in response to market conditions. Long periods of slow gradual inflation are fine, as people simply demand that their wages rise at a steady 2-3% to keep up with inflation, and employers expect it. But if there is a sudden spike in prices, it's a lot harder for employees to suddenly negotiate wage increases. Instead, the slower process of labor market competition, employees leaving underpaying jobs for better paying jobs, has to take over. It's going to take a few years for wages to catch up with the spike in prices, but it does happen with time, primarily from people switching jobs.
- I've never had a 2% pay raise since I started my career in 2008.
  
  Not by staying in one company anyway. I had to change companies every time and even then it was hard negotiating anything above what I was making before.
You misspelled price gouging.
Sure. But inflation is down, we didn't go into a recession, and wage growth has been outpacing inflation for over a year now.

This is good, we're going in the right direction. Deflation would be way worse.
- Going in the right direction is fantastic except that it takes too long to really feel the impact, so all the low information voters will put in a republican, they'll just happen to be in office when the good times hit, but then they'll ruin it completely, which won't be felt until a Democrat takes over, who then will have to clean up the mess, repeat ad infinitum
- We should raise the minimum wage until it is commensurate with the price gouging. All at once, since none of the corporations eased us into higher prices.
  
  But we have zero parties in this country that are willing to raise the minimum wage at the national level.
Yeah but unfortunately that's never going to change. Inflation is the rate of increase and they always want a rate of increase, just at 2%.

It's never going to go negative because growth for the growth gods!! :(
- Actually, it will never go negative (I hope) because if it goes negative we're probably in for a massive global recession that will introduce untold suffering.
  
  You think they aim for 2% because that's what's good for rich people? 2% is the magic number for the whole economy.
- Line must go up.
- There are already alternatives available that do go negative.
You want a deflationary environment? Are you sure?
- That's what you got from my one line comment?
- If "deflationary environment" is neoliberal for "restrictions on and immediate reduction of the current ongoing price gouging" then call me Moleman cuz yes, i want that, right now.