Last week I said the jobs report wasn’t that bad, despite the miss. Well, today’s CPI report was bad, really bad. Many categories hit multi-decade highs, and many adults are seeing the largest increases in their lifetimes. Here’s the monthly breakdown:

▪️The CPI was ⬆️0.8% in Oct for all items. While a slight drop from last month’s 0.9% rise, year over year (YoY) it’s up 6.8%, a sharp increase from 6.2% last month, and the most since June 1982! It’s now up 6.5% in 2021 with one month to go, so it’s now likely we’ll see a 7% CPI for 2021.

▪️The index for all items less food and energy (aka “Core CPI”) was +0.6% in Oct, now +4.9% YoY, the most since June 1991. This was a jump from +4.6% last month, and substantially above the Fed’s stated target of 2%.

▪️Every major category saw increases in Oct, the only question was it a multi-year or multi-decade high? To find any indexes that decreased you had to go to the subcategories, and still there were only 3; motor vehicle insurance (-0.8%), recreation (-0.2%) and communications (-0.2%).

▪️Food was +0.7% in Nov and +6.1% YoY, the largest increase since Oct 2008. All 6 grocery store indexes again rose, no diet was spared. Fruits and veggies actually outpaced meats last month, rising 1.0% compared to 0.9% for meats.

▪️Many foods have huge YoY increases. Beef is now +20.9% YoY, pork is +16.8%, chicken +9.2%, fish +8.0% and eggs +8.0%. If you’ve noticed at the store, it’s not your imagination. Food away from home is also up +5.8%, the most since Jan 1982.

▪️Energy, continued to spike in Nov, +4.8%, now up a whopping +33.3% YoY, the most since Sept 2005. Gasoline was even worse, +6.1% and +58.1% YoY, the most since Apr 1980! Natural gas only surged 0.6% but is still +25.1% YoY. Remember, food and energy are excluded from the Core CPI.

▪️Shelter was ⬆️0.5% and +3.8% YoY, the most since Jun 2007, with owners’ equivalent rent at +0.4% (3.5% YoY). Shelter makes up a large portion of the CPI (32%), so is currently helping to keep the inflation numbers somewhat grounded.

▪️Used cars surged again, +2.5% and 31.4% YoY. New vehicles also up big, +1.1% and +11.1% YoY, the most since Apr 1975! Rental cars were even worse, +1.1% in Nov and a whopping 37.2% YoY.

▪️Getting away has also gotten more expensive, reversing recent month declines. Hotels were up 3.2% (+25.5% YoY), while airline fares finally reversed their multi-month declines as I predicted, and spiked +4.7% (but still -3.7% YoY).

▪️Last month clobbered the hope that price inflation was transitory, but this month is worse, as people will now wonder how bad it will get. We’re well above 5%, which would have seemed almost unthinkable a year ago. But where will we go, 7%, 10%, higher?

▪️With every month of high inflation data, two things happen. More people stop trusting the leaders have a handle on the problem, as they’ve been wrong repeatedly, and the measures to stop price inflation become more difficult. If CPI is at 7%, imagine the Fed needing to raise rates to 8%+ to fight it! Instead, interest rates have never been further from the CPI, so it’s adding fuel to the fire.

▪️The one silver lining is that oil prices fell considerably in the last month, so that could ease the CPI readings in the coming months. But other categories which were previously not surging, like apparel and transportation services, are now rising, as is shelter, which means high readings could continue.

▪️Thankfully, alcoholic beverages continued to be a bright spot, staying flat in Nov. (and just +1.9% YoY). Beer declined again by 0.3% and whiskey was -0.2%, so you can continue drowning your inflation sorrows, cheers 🍻

CPI report:
https://www.bls.gov/news.release/cpi.nr0.htm