What Inflation? - ECRI Future Inflation Gauge
Inflation gauge at highest in over 5 yrs
Oct 7, 2005 — NEW YORK (Reuters) - U.S. inflation pressures climbed in September to their highest in over five years, according to a report on Friday that suggested the Federal Reserve was right to remain vigilant over price increases.
The Economic Cycle Research Institute said its Future Inflation Gauge rose to 122.7 last month, its highest since June 2000, the tail end of the late 1990s economic boom.
August's reading was revised down to 120.7.
Over the past few weeks, Fed officials have gone out of their way to remind investors and consumers that they must continue to raise interest rates to ward off inflation.
The survey's annualized growth rate, which smoothes out month-to-month variance, jumped to 6.6 percent from 3.7 percent.
"If the Fed continues to approach policy as an exercise in managing risks, the clear danger remains inflation and not recession," said Lakshman Achuthan, managing director at ECRI, an independent research group.
"Certainly, for people who live in the real world, talking about inflation while ignoring food and energy prices, as economists still do, is like asking, "Aside from that, Mrs. Lincoln, how did you like the play?" And even some dismal scientists believe that energy, at least, should get closer scrutiny. "One could argue strongly that a key element driving inflation is indeed energy," says Lakshman Achuthan, managing director of the Economic Cycle Research Institute, which produces a leading inflation indicator that includes energy prices. "I don't know what you accomplish by removing energy from the discussion -- it's 'core' to the discussion."
