28 Jul 2025

Heat Wave Inflation: A Decade Running Hot

Last week, I described Vanguard’s take on growth and inflation, and it got me thinking about inflation. In general, I was comforted by their views, which I characterized as ‘Steady as She Goes,’ but the inflation number started to bother me a little bit. Their forecast is for core Personal Consumption Expenditure (PCE), which is the Federal Reserve’s preferred measure for inflation, and Vanguard projected 3.0 percent for 2025 and… Read More

25 Jul 2022

Looking at Inflation, Backwards and Forwards

Inflation is hard to measure, which is why there are many ways to measure it. In addition to the Consumer Price Inflation (CPI) indexes that I’ve discussed in recent months, there are also Producer Price Indexes (PPI), the Personal Consumption Expenditures (PCE) indexes, the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) purchased price index, the GDP price index, and the GDP Price Deflator index. Oh my! While I don’t intend for this letter… Read More