CLARION, Pa. (EYT) – Patton Financial Advising submitted the following article: What Stubborn Inflation Could Mean for the US Economy.
On April 10, 2024, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics released the Consumer Price Index (CPI) for March, and the increase in CPI — the most commonly cited measure of inflation — was higher than expected. The rate for all items (headline inflation) was 3.5% over the previous year, while the “core CPI” rate, which strips out volatile food and energy prices, was even higher at 3.8%. The month-over-month change was also higher than anticipated at 0.4%.
The stock market dropped sharply on this news and continued to slide over the following days, while economists engaged in public handwringing over why their projections had been wrong and what the higher numbers might mean for the future path of interest rates. In fact, most projections were off…