Your Place in Cyber Space for Inflation Data
On September 13th 2018, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics released their monthly Consumer Price Index report on the status of Inflation for the 12 months through the end of August. Annual Inflation is Down Annual inflation in August was 2.70% down from 2.95% in July and 2.87% in June. (BLS rounds both to 2.9%) CPI was 252.146 in August, 252.006 in July and 251.989 in June. Monthly Inflation for August was 0.06%, July was 0.01%, and June was 0.16% compared to 0.30% in August 2017. … [Read More...]
Venezuela was once considered a model of the wonders of Socialism because President Hugo Chavez was initially able to tap the Oil “piggy bank”. He nationalized oil companies, utilities, and cement production. He repatriated Gold reserves from London and unlike other OPEC countries Venezuela did not establish a “Sovereign Wealth Fund” but instead destroyed the manufacturing base and spent the oil and gold reserves on unsustainable social programs. Beginning in 2001 with oil prices recovering Hugo Chavez was a local hero seen as Robin Hood by the poor of Venezuela. But oil prices are cyclical and soon their prices began to fall once more and the lack of competition, malinvestment, and no reserves began to take its toll.
When you think of a city with a “high cost of living” you might think of Los Angeles. After all, you’ve probably seen some HGTV show where Tarek and Christina or The Property Brothers buy a tiny old house for half a million dollars and it needs a ton of renovations just to make it livable! So LA has to be an expensive place to live… right? Well compared to New York… not so much. Let’s look at the cost of living in various cities around the world.
On August 10th 2018, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics released their monthly Consumer Price Index report on the status of Inflation for the 12 months through the end of July. Annual Inflation is Up Very Slightly Annual inflation in July was 2.95% up slightly from 2.87% in June. (BLS rounds both to 2.9%) CPI was […]
The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics released the Annual Inflation Rate data for the year through the end of June on July 12th 2018.
There are many types of disruption, some can cause higher inflation but there are other types that can lower inflation and improve people’s lives.
Back in 1918 gasoline was $0.25 a gallon and by 1932 prices had fallen to 18 cents a gallon! But as we all know over the last 100 years the purchasing power of the dollar has fallen drastically so in order to get the true picture we can’t just say that the lowest price of gas was 18 cents per gallon, we need to adjust the price for inflation.
Electricity Price Inflation Residential electricity prices in the U.S. have risen from an average of 7.83 cents per kilowatthour in 1990 to an average of 11.44 cents per kwh in 2010. This is a 46% increase in 20 years and sounds like a lot but as you can see from the chart below for many years[Read More…]
Source: inflationdata.com | NYSE Index Inflation Commentary To Print this Chart: When Printer dialog box appears be sure to switch to Landscape mode Note: Please feel free to link to this page but not to the image itself as the image may be renamed (or deleted) when it is updated but the page URL will[Read More…]
Your Ability to Choose Should Increase Competition In years past consumers didn’t have a lot of choice when it came to their natural gas supplier, they were tied to the local gas utility, so if they wanted to charge a 541% markup you were pretty much stuck. But just prior to the new millennium states began[Read More…]
Inflation Adjusted Real Estate Prices- Lets take a look at the idea that housing prices always go up. Of course, each neighborhood is different, so some neighborhoods might be going down while a few miles away housing prices are skyrocketing but by looking at the nationwide average we can get a better picture of the overall trend. The St. Louis Federal Reserve publishes the following chart that shows the S&P/Case Shiller National Home Price Index and by adjusting those prices for inflation we can get a better picture of how real estate prices really act. Is a home a good investment or not?
Inflation Indexed Bonds Performance- U.S. Treasury Inflation indexed bonds are supposed to protect you from the ravages of inflation while providing a safe and decent rate of return on your money. Obviously, since safety is generally inversely proportional to risk, if inflation indexed bonds are very safe you would expect the rate of return to be[Read More…]
