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News > U.S.

US Inflation Rate Reaches 6.8%, Unheard of in Nearly 40 Years

  • US inflation hits 6.8%, the highest inflation rate in 40 years.

    US inflation hits 6.8%, the highest inflation rate in 40 years. | Photo: Twitter/@Crypto_Oracles_

Published 10 December 2021
Opinion

The year-on-year rate of inflation in the United States rose in November to 6.8%, the highest in almost 40 years, increasing pressure on the Federal Reserve to take containment measures.

Consumer prices rose by eight-tenths in a month, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported.

The 6.8% represents the highest year-on-year inflation figure since June 1982, at the end of the great inflationary period of the 1970s in the United States, which was brought on by runaway oil prices.

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The November figure was even above the predictions of most analysts, who were expecting a rate above 6% but not as close to 7% as was the case.

Excluding food and fuel prices, which are the most volatile, core inflation in October was 0.5% in the US, with an annual rate of 4.9%.

Energy prices rose by 3.5% in October and food prices rose by 0.7%, according to the U.S. government report.

Specifically, prices consumers pay for gasoline rose 6.1% last month and are up 58.1% in a year.

Friday's data adds pressure to the Federal Reserve (Fed, which is responsible for dictating U.S. monetary policy), which has a dual mandate of promoting full employment and price stability.

Soaring inflation as reflected in today's data could lead U.S. central bankers to accelerate the pace or amount of stimulus withdrawal.

"The high inflation in the United States has two fundamental causes: the financial stimulus policy implemented over the past year and a half in response to the crisis of the COVID-19 and the shortage of labor," Connel Fullenkamp, professor of economics at Duke University, told EFE.

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