Americans have paid higher prices for everything from utilities to groceries in 2021. But as the specter of inflation haunts the US economy for the first time in decades, it has been the poorer members of society who have suffered the most, a phenomenon economists are calling “inflation inequality”.
The US inflation rate rose 6.8% since last November, according to labor department data, the highest annual increase in nearly 40 years. Those price increases have been largely driven by essential goods and services: transportation, energy, housing and food.
The headline figure of 6.8% doesn’t tell the full story. Not everything got more expensive. Airline fares, eyeglasses and medicinal drugs stayed relatively stable or even got more affordable.
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