Incomes Got Chewed Up by Inflation. Americans Spent Heroically on Goods, But Not on Services. Eviction Moratoriums & Forbearance Implicated by Wolf Richter • Oct 1, 2021 • 144 Comments Millions of people didn’t spend on two big services: rent & interest. How spending got skewed in bizarre ways.
Fed’s Lowest Lowball Inflation Measure Hits 30-Year High by Wolf Richter • Oct 1, 2021 • 118 Comments “Transitory” is the new Spandex.
“Transitory” is the New Spandex: Powell Admits it, Still Denies its Cause. Why this Inflation Won’t Go Away on its Own by Wolf Richter • Sep 29, 2021 • 206 Comments Blames tangled-up supply chains but not what’s causing supply chains to get tangled up: The most grotesquely overstimulated economy ever.
Unfinished Houses for Sale Pile Up, Total Inventory Highest since 2008, amid Material Shortages & Worst Spike in Construction Costs since 1979 by Wolf Richter • Sep 24, 2021 • 253 Comments Sales of new single-family houses fall 24% from a year ago. The lower end has died.
Social Security COLA for 2022 to be Near 5.8%, Could Match 2009, Biggest since 1982 by Wolf Richter • Sep 14, 2021 • 137 Comments But it still won’t cover the dollar’s actual loss of purchasing power.
Inflation Whac-A-Mole: New Vehicle Prices Spike as Used Vehicle Prices Dip, while Housing Inflation, which Exploded in Reality, Barely Budged in the CPI by Wolf Richter • Sep 14, 2021 • 86 Comments CPI inflation remains at 12-year high.
Americans Expect their Earnings to Get Whacked by Red-Hot Inflation, Blow Off Fed’s Sermons about “Temporary” by Wolf Richter • Sep 13, 2021 • 170 Comments And those who experienced the 1970s & 1980s inflation as adults expect 6.0% inflation a year from now.
Up the Price Pipeline, Inflation Rages at 20% by Wolf Richter • Sep 10, 2021 • 279 Comments Producer prices that are input prices for consumer-facing industries are red-hot. But further up the production chain, prices are white-hot.
The Everything Shortage & Price Hikes Plastered All Over Fed’s “Beige Book” by Wolf Richter • Sep 8, 2021 • 180 Comments “We need lower consumer demand to give supply chains time to catch up… recover efficiency… and break this vicious circle”: CEO of Maersk’s APM Terminals, one of the largest container port operators.
The Monstrous Flow of Free Money and the Shortages by Wolf Richter • Sep 2, 2021 • 142 Comments Free money destroyed the pricing mechanism, and demand has soared despite much higher prices.
