BALTIMORE — The Consumer Price Index comes out May 11 at 8:30 a.m.
The Consumer Price Index is the measure of prices for goods and services in the U.S. It's also used as the leading measure of inflation. One thing some experts think it will tell us today is that grocery prices are expected to continue to go up.
The U.S. Department of Agriculture predicts at-home food prices, the food consumers buy at the grocery store to eat at home, will increase between 5% and 6% this year.
Families across the country are feeling the pinch of inflation.
Grocery prices have been rising since last fall. Inflation was at 5.4% in September 2021.
Inflation has been rising steadily to 8.5% in March 2022.
Since January 2022, when inflation hit 7.5%, inflation has been reaching levels not seen since the Reagan administration.
Fast forward 40 years, and the Biden administration wants to lower rising energy costs by releasing one million barrels of oil a day from the strategic petroleum reserves, and now extending that for the next six months.
The President also is calling on congress to pass clean energy and vehicle tax credits, as well as advancing the highest ever fuel economy standards for cars and trucks.
Some are getting creative until inflation starts to come down.
An organization called “The Food Group” provides high-quality, low-priced groceries to more than 50,000 households in the midwest through its pop-up mobile markets.
The Food Group executive director Sophia Lenarz-Coy said “you got your medical costs, your rent, your other fixed costs? food is the flex, and so for folks on limited incomes, inflation makes it so you have to cut back somewhere.
The USDA expects grocery prices to keep going up, while some experts are anticipating inflation might have dropped a bit in April.
