The (government disinformation) CPI numbers don't begin to actually tell the true story of the soaring inflation rate here in the U.S. The real numbers are MUCH worse than those admitted to by the Feds. By keeping the CPI numbers artifically low, the government avoids having to substantially increase monthly SSI payments to the millions of retired workers - out of the already bankrupt "trust fund", a collection of IOUs that our children and our grandchildren will be paying on in ever higher taxes for the rest of their lives. (Can you spell "Indentured Servitude"??? The real rate of inflation is now running at an annual rate of about 10%.  If you are putting money in a CD at 5% and then paying taxes on the interest you earn, you are actually loosing at least 6% of the value of your personaly savings. The ONLY way that you can stop this insane madness is to insist that your representatives in congress cut government spending. (Fat chance!)  

well only 'core' CPI matters... because you don't HAVE to eat... or heat your house... or drive your car...those are discrentionary spending that doesn't affect actual 'core' inflation...

;-)

Is the wise Philip a government crony?  I don't know about him, but having to spend more on Food and Gas does lower my standard of living.

Please don't listen to his rediculous argument.

Supposedly, the "core" CPI is based on a basket of goods and services. What is in this basket of goods and services and who buys these goods and services? If the basket of goods and services includes *** augmentation (as in Spain's main inflation index) or marshmallow peeps, no wonder I feel so disconnected from our misleadingly low inflation rate. If it included things I actually pay for (food, gas, housing, higher education, health care) we would probably see much higher numbers (although brought lower buy the continually falling costs of plastic surgery and marshmallow peeps). Maybe the a new "core" index should exclusively follow the essential goods and services- food, housing, healthcare, etc.

I've been thinking about this more than a little over the past 5 years.  I've come to the conclusion that we need an open-source (trite, over-hused, hyped word, but descriptive) basket of goods.  Then I could see what inflation is doing to me and my money, even if the Feds don't care to consider it.  I don't buy a lot of things with chips in them, which the Fed has loaded their basket up with, in order to take advantage of Moore's law.

So, I've been working on what should go into the list of goods whose prices I can compile myself on (probably) a quarterly basis (attempting to avoid sales around holidays: Thanksgiving, Christmas, 4th of July, Halloween, NYE, Superbowl, Easter (eggs & chicken afterwards), etc)

1# 98% lean ground beef

1# 90%? lean ground beef

1# skinless, boneless chicken ***

doz. regular AA eggs

5# of granulated sugar

5# of white flour

1# of butter (brand issues - what about margarine?)

salt

loaf of bread - by weight (balloon bread vs. better bread?)

peanut butter (generic)

10# bag of potatos

# rice (10lb or 5lb bag, white, regular)

campbell's tomato soup/ounce (small can)

campbell's cream of mushroom soup/ounce (small can)

frozen corn/ounce (small bag)

frozen carrots/ounce (small bag)

frozen peas/ounce (small bag)

canned peas/ounce (small can)

canned corn/ounce (small can)

canned peaches/ounce (small can)

canned pears/ounce (small can)

whole kosher dill pickles/ounce (med jar)

bottled water (brand issues? distilled would include a measure of energy cost)

1# coffee (brand issues?)

cheapest generic 6pack of cola (includes cost of aluminium for recycling)

chocolate (perhaps hershey? but that's a single brand - bad)

kool-aid?

vinegar

baking soda

bleach

detergent

bar of soap

shampoo

(Fresh veggies - out due to seasonal and sale price fluctuations)

T-shirt (define better? white wife-beater?)

Jeans

bicycle tube (26")

gal of unleaded gas

transmmission oil

taxi rate (2-3 services @ random, keep the lowest for next time) flag drop & per mile

bus fare

housing (very hard to guage, different locations == different pricing)

vehicles (same as housing)

propane cynlinder

heating oil

cord of hardwood (slippery definitions here)

house air filter (size? efficiency?)

wet-dry vac rental cost

broom?

mop?

box of screws (define better)

gallon of white latex paint

8' 2x4 pine

4'x8' sheet of drywall

1' copper pipe (diameter?)

10' 1" sch40 PVC pipe

shingles

insulation

caulking

wood glue

aluminum recycling offered at what price a #?

ream of paper (define this better)

paperback novel

movie ticket, weekend, evening

CD/media? music (dying - so not a good long-term measure?,  digital downloads)

DVDs? (also dying, blu-ray in the next 10 years)

sewage rate? (how to measure?)

water rates?

electrical rates? (how to measure on preferential pricing plans)

natural gas?

college tuition (full time semester)

medical costs (how do you measure those long-term?)

If anyone wants to suggest some items, feel free - spamchecker431 hotmail

I agree with Mr. Neutron. Currently we accept that the inflation rate is a specific number released by someone who is supposed to know. An article in Kiplingers magazine a month or so ago hit this topic head on. In the article the figures that are released are compared with what the average person actually spends. The one that is most rememberable is for each $100,000 of income for an average family about $3000 is spent on college. I guess if you average the households who have students verses the households that don't it could be accurate. Who knows?

I doubt many people keep track of their spending on items such as what Mr. N. has in his list. If there were a website that people could go to and enter the details of their average expenses, it would provide a more accurate representation of the average inflation rate. Even if this did nothing to change government, it could help people plan better for the future.

Mr. Neutron has an excellent idea.  Can I call him Mr. N?

IMHO this inflation measure is kept intentionally low. By doing this it keeps cost of living increases for workers and most importantly for Social Security reci[pients very low. I did read the article in Kiplinger about how the CPI was derived...what a joke! As the parent of a daughter who just went thru 4 years of College, I can assure you ore than $3000 per year was spent on her education. That was just about what we spent on books, pencils, computers, etc...per year.

The biggest joke of the CPI is that since the 90's, I believe, it has substituted "owner's equivalent rent" for the true cost of buying and maintaining a home.

The upshot of which is, I can now "buy" a Bay Area condo for $5000 a month, while the BLS only computes the $1500 it would rent for.

RIGHT ON, Mr. Neutron. My only suggestion: Base figures on a 'per pound/per ounce/per something' measurement, otherwise you'd have the gov't trying to compare today's 23.2209 oz box of something with 1998's 30.0 oz box and saying 'You can actually buy a box of X for LESS today than in 1998!!' That's why I don't pay attention to stats--almost always jiggered. 'Liars figure and figures lie.'