Growth, inflation, wages and employment covered in terms of what they do to family finances. Coverage pairs national figures with regional breakdowns and the categories where price changes bite hardest. Written for consumer analysts, brand and pricing teams, and readers managing a budget against a moving cost base.
The Consumer Price Index comes from monthly price checks on roughly 80,000 items across dozens of U.S. areas, weighted by a separate survey of household spending.
Lena Fischer · August 15, 2026
A quarter of the U.S. consumer price index tracks a rent no homeowner pays. Here is how the Bureau of Labor Statistics builds the number, and why it lags market rents.
Lena Fischer · August 13, 2026
The Federal Reserve lowered its policy rate 50 basis points to 4.75-5.00 percent in September 2024, its first cut since March 2020, citing rising labor-market risk.
Lena Fischer · August 10, 2026
Americans routinely tell surveyors the economy is terrible and then keep spending — and the 2022–2025 cycle proved the mood-spending gap can last years.
Lena Fischer · July 23, 2026
Quantitative tightening lets maturing bonds roll off unreplaced — up to $95 billion a month at peak — and its design goal is being boring, which the 2019 repo spike showed is not guaranteed.
Monica Cummings · June 30, 2026