WASHINGTON, Jan. 16, 2008
Inflation Hits 17-Year High
Prices For Food And Energy Rise By Largest Amount Since 1990
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(AP/PHOTODISC/CBS)
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The Labor Department reported that consumer prices rose by 4.1 percent for all of 2007, up sharply from a 2.5 percent increase in 2006. Both energy and food prices jumped by the largest amount since 1990.
Prices were also up sharply for health care, housing and education. However, these gains were offset somewhat by falling prices for clothing, new cars and computers.
Workers' wages failed to keep up with the higher inflation. Average weekly earnings, after adjusting for inflation, dropped by 0.9 percent in 2007, the fourth decline in the past five years. The lagging wage gains are cited as a chief reason many workers have growing anxiety about their economic futures.
Core inflation, which excludes both energy and food, rose 2.4 percent last year, slightly lower than the 2.6 percent increase of 2006. It is the performance of core inflation that the Fed closely monitors.
Analysts said the slight drop in core inflation for 2007 plus various reports showing the economy is in the grips of a serious slowdown will convince the central bank that a key interest rate it controls should be reduced by a bold half-point when Fed officials next meet on Jan. 30-31.
"Price pressures may be a little greater than the Fed would like but with the economy hitting the skids, inflation is not so high to stand in the way of aggressive action," predicted Joel Naroff, chief economist at Naroff Economic Advisers.
Providing further evidence of a slowing economy, the Fed reported that output at the nation's factories was flat in December, the worst showing since an outright decline of 0.5 percent in October. Economists said that poor reading confirmed their view that the manufacturing sector has slipped into a recession.
In a separate report, the Fed said its latest survey of economic conditions around the country showed the economy was losing momentum heading into 2008 although seven of the 12 Fed regions did report slight increases in activity.
The mounting signs of economic weakness have greatly raised concerns that the economy could be slipping into a recession. Unemployment jumped from 4.7 percent in November to 5 percent in December, the biggest one-month increase since the aftermath of the 2001 terrorist attacks. Many of the nation's biggest financial institutions have been reporting billions of dollars in losses, reflecting the meltdown in the subprime mortgage market that was triggered by a two-year long slump in housing.
The December weakness in industrial production reflected flat output at U.S. factories. For the year, output at auto plants fell by 4.1 percent as Detroit continues to struggle with falling demand in the face of soaring gasoline prices. Industries connected to the troubled housing sector including wood products and furniture also suffered big declines for the year.
"We believe that today's report confirms that manufacturing is in a recession," said Daniel Meckstroth, chief economist for the Manufacturers Alliance/MAPI. "General growth in exports and a few bright spots in aerospace, high tech and medical equipment cannot mitigate weak consumer spending and increasingly slow and cautious business investment activity."
For December, the Consumer Price Index rose by 0.3 percent, slower than the 0.8 percent jump in November, as food costs were flat for the month and energy prices rose by 0.9 percent after an even bigger 5.7 percent jump in November. Outside of food and energy, core inflation rose a more moderate 0.2 percent in December.
The rising risk of a recession has prompted politicians to consider stimulus packages to give the economy a jump-start to either prevent a recession or at least mitigate its fallout. President Bush has said he may unveil a plan around his Jan. 28 State of the Union address. Democrats in Congress and presidential candidates in both parties are putting forward their own plans.
The 4.1 percent increase in overall prices last year was the biggest since a 6.1 percent jump in prices in 1990.
Overall energy costs rose by 17.4 percent this past year while food costs rose by 4.9 percent. Both were the biggest increases since 1990. Gasoline prices were up 29.6 percent, the biggest increase since they soared by 30.1 percent in 1999.
© MVIII The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
Federal gasoline taxes being raised another 40 cents to repair infrastructure, which should have been done in lieu of tax cuts. That should raise prices of anything transported anywhere.
Are those who voted for this chimp happy ?
Get rid of all social services!!!
Get rid of the minimum wage!!!
Get rid of all health care!!!
And if need be, get rid of some of those excess worthless "people" who have a net worth of less than $500,000,000.!!!
I mean why drag it out any longer? Humanity doesn''t count for anything, just money. So let''s all just join hands and jump right over the cliff together, voluntarily and with a smile.
But no matter what, don''t start paying people a living wage, and don''t punish all those in our government and its corporate minions for literally bleeding our country dry, and betraying it by selling it to the Chinese and many of our other enemies. While claiming to fight for freedom and democracy as they slaughter tens of thousands of innocents in foreign lands.
No. Don''t do that.
Let''s do the cliff thing.
ST
"Truth is defined by the weakest of us who must suffer through it."
SearingTruth
A Future of the Brave - www.searingtruth.com
Oh noooo -- what are bushites going to do?? A serious problem and they can''t blame it on Bill???
The end of Bush''s Presidency you aren''t going to find one single person in this country willing to admit that they voted for Ole Georgie Boy!! He''s going to go down in history as America''s absolutely worst president.
If Faux News covers this - and that''s a big IF - then its going to be a quiet little blurb at tail end of the news hour and following a cute little story about Bush and his doggie!
Get the hell out of Iraq and quit funding a lost cause...
Quit playing the interst rate game...
Make tax rates equitable across the board, and quit allowing loopholes and business deducations...
Quit paying uneducated women to stay home and have babies...
Get alternative fuel vehicles on the road NOW...make everyone in the city drive golf carts, we don''t need cars that go 120 mph on city streets, much less a doolie pick up to take us 5 blocks to work.
There''s all kinds of ways to save money folks, if you apply yourself to it.
The problem is, nobody wants to. And nobody seems to want to stir our leaders into doing what''s right for the people. It''s easier to sit with tv clicker in hand and rant and rave at the tv.
But it is still a great example of the conservative evangelical republican agenda in action,
The evangelical war against humanty continues
It is a disheartening truth that terrorists didn%u2019t steal our dignity, liberty, and freedom, Republicans did.
Few knew that when the Republican Party declared a war on culture many decades ago, they meant a war on the culture of American liberty itself.
For it is not by accident that we find ourselves left today with only one heinously corrupt branch of government; an executive branch which openly and proudly violates every principal, and fulfills every fear, of our revered founding fathers. And it is not by chance that the Republican Party facetiously exclaims that it has simply always been this way, and we just never noticed.
And of course, our new dictatorship has nothing to do with %u201Cterrorism%u201D.
For 225 years America had fought many external enemies, far more powerful than those we fight today, without abandoning our Constitutional form of government.
In fact, wielding the moral right and might embodied within our Constitution had always naturally defeated any enemy espousing philosophies of tyranny and oppression. ..."
Excerpt from A Future of the Brave - www.searingtruth.com
Well said indeed.
Consumer is just another word for a "user." and a heavy consumer is just another term for a glutton.
Posted by MCVet at 02:52 PM : Jan 16, 2008
Those who believe in "trickle down economics" also subscribe to golden showers--you have to be pretty deviant to expect those with money to not keep or spend it for themselves and reinvest it in a population that they do not care about. That is the reason many want to base themselves in foreign lands--they will use the average "consumer" (read as material pig) until they use them up, then they will move on to other markets.
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Posted by SgtRDS at 04:09 PM : Jan 16, 2008
+ report abuse
I guess you already forgot..how much sacrifice are you willing to give for your country??? a few hours a day of whinning at cbs boards?
reading several of your posts...i really starting to doubt the truth of you being in the military..I would hate to see men being led around by a sargent who''s level of tolerance is as shallow as yours.
**********
learn some economics....
In fact, wielding the moral right and might embodied within our Constitution had always naturally defeated any enemy espousing philosophies of tyranny and oppression. ..."
Excerpt from A Future of the Brave - www.searingtruth.com
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Posted by SearingTruth at 03:48 PM : Jan 16, 2008
+ report abuse
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but then you forgot that in the history of this country, we are engaged with an enemy is using an unorthodox method of warfare...they know the liberal political correctness that is poisoning this country and they are using it to use as a shield, to use as a weapon and use it to misguide morons like you.
name one constiutional rights you lost..................
1. Making less with the service jobs that replaced our lost manufacturing jobs.
2. Paying more for essentials like Gas, food, heat, power, health care, education, etc.
3. Loosing homes through foreclosure from shady mortgages, job loss or catastrophic health care costs.
4. Loosing Pensions from employers going chapter 11.
With all of the above increasingly happening in America, our government is worried that the American masses may cause a recession because we are SPENDING LESS!!!
This situation just makes you want to Bbitch-Slap someone.
Posted by parrot2 at 04:15 PM : Jan 16, 2008
libsluvesuvs showed up, but is worthless to talk too..........
Posted by parrot2 at 04:15 PM : Jan 16, 2008
libsluvesuvs showed up, but is worthless to talk too..........
Posted by parrot2 at 04:15 PM : Jan 16, 2008
You rang? BTW, I''m not a repukecan,,nor a dimowitcrat.
And I ''ve been saying along, that if prices were not kept low, we''d been a world of hurt.
Looks like I was right, unfortunately!
By the way, who was president 17 years ago? Oh yea, George HW Bush. Just a coincidence?
Posted by libsluvsuvs at 04:33 PM : Jan 16, 2008
Privacy
Posted by libsluvsuvs at 04:33 PM : Jan 16, 2008
Habeas Corpus
They have granted a monopoly to big businesses that shop your jobs overseas to the cheapest bidder while charging you more for the cheaper product.
1. Making less with the service jobs that replaced our lost manufacturing jobs.
2. Paying more for essentials like Gas, food, heat, power, health care, education, etc.
3. Loosing homes through foreclosure from shady mortgages, job loss or catastrophic health care costs.
4. Loosing Pensions from employers going chapter 11.
With all of the above increasingly happening in America, our government is worried that the American masses may cause a recession because we are SPENDING LESS!!!
Posted by ianlou,
Excellent Point. The only reason the Bush administration has not made this a priority is because the middle class cannot afford to make political contributions to the GOP.
Posted by takebackus
Lol, no coincidence, junior is playing the same game daddy had played.
Posted by joesrc1 at 06:58 PM : Jan 16, 2008
Have you seen the price of milk and honey these days?
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Posted by joesrc1 at 06:58 PM : Jan 16, 2008
+ report abuse
Honey, the dang cow is dry! Our Commander in Chief is hiding the real cow from you until he can skip town. All that''s left is BUSHIT!!!
Posted by takebackus
Lol, no coincidence, junior is playing the same game daddy had played.
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Posted by mcv57 at 06:39 PM : Jan 16, 2008
+ report abuse
And junior isn''t smart enough to play his own game so he has to use his daddy''s past presidency to model his by.
Prices For Food And Energy Rise By Largest Amount Since 1990
WELCOME TO THE BUSH BUBBLE, WHAT''S CHENEY UP?
Prices For Food And Energy Rise By Largest Amount Since 1990
WELCOME TO THE BUSH BUBBLE, WHAT''S CHENEY UP TO?
BTW, KARL ROVE WAS GIVING THE GOP A LECTURE ON HOW TO BEAT THE DEMS IN THE COMING ELECTION.
HE EVEN HAD THE GULL TO TELL PEOPLE THEY CAN FIX THE ECONOMY.
IS THAT THE FUNNYEST P H U K ER IN THE WORLD.
WHEN ROVE STARTs WEARING HIS BOZO CLOWN SUIT IN PUBLIC THEN HE''LL GET MY RESPECT!
Lies, lies, lies.
My sugar daddy Bush told me so.
there is no such thing as inflation!!!
la la la la la la
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HAHAHAHAHAHAHAH
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Posted by veteran71 at 10:13 PM : Jan 16, 2008
+ report abuse
LOL Well according to some in the Race for President can not figure this all out.. Well those in the Republican Party anyway. They want to just keep on with the same Borrow and Spend we''ve lived through in the Bush Administration. They always PROMISE to get things straightened out but never do.
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by ianlou
January 17, 2008 2:34 PM PST
- The only thing our goverment cares about concerning the middle class is how much we spend and who we vote for.
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