Inflation continues to be running at barely noticeable levels. The personal consumption expenditures price index, the Fed’s preferred inflation gauge, rose just 0.3 percent in March from a year earlier, the Commerce Department said yesterday. That's the same rate of increase that we saw in February as well.
Other measures looked a bit higher, but not extraordinarily so. Excluding the volatile food and energy categories, prices climbed 1.3 percent in March from a year earlier, the fourth consecutive month at that rate.
This has been going on for a really long time now. March was the 35th consecutive month that inflation has undershot the Fed’s stated inflation goal of 2 percent. We haven't had a month with the personal consumption expenditures index above 2 percent since May 2012.
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