Is inflation currently at a historic high?
By EconoFact
Copy link
Copy featured image
NO
The change in the seasonally adjusted Consumer Price Index (CPI) for All Urban Consumers between June 2020 and June 2021 was 5.32%. This statistic, the year-on-year monthly inflation rate, was 5.28% in July. This is the highest the inflation rate has been since September 2008.
But the average year-on-year monthly inflation rate in the 1970s was 7.1% and 5.6% in the 1980s. In the 1981 to 1982 period the average inflation rate was 12%. Year-on-year inflation exceeded 10% in every month between February 1974 and April 1975, March 1979 through April 1981 and July through October 1981.
This fact brief is responsive to conversations such as this one.
Sources
FRED (Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis) Consumer Price Index for All Urban Consumers: All Items in US City Average
US Bureau of Labor Statistics Consumer Price Index news release (latest month)
US Bureau of Labor Statistics Consumer Price Index news release (June 2021)
US Bureau of Labor Statistics Consumer Price Index news release (May 2021)
ABOUT THE CONTRIBUTOR
EconoFact is a non-partisan publication designed to bring key facts and incisive analysis to the national debate on economic and social policies. Launched in January 2017, it is written by leading academic economists from across the country who belong to the EconoFact Network. It is published by the Edward R. Murrow Center for a Digital World at The Fletcher School at Tufts University.
