By Vince Golle and Craig Stirling The Federal Reserve’s favored inflation yardsticks are poised to show the tamest monthly advances since late last year — a stepping stone for officials to begin lowering interest rates, possibly as soon as September. Economists expect no change in the May personal consumption expenditures price index and a minimal 0.1% gain in the core measure that excludes […]
By Nick Timiraos The Federal Reserve voted to lower interest rates by a half percentage point, opting for a bolder start in making its first reduction since 2020. The long-anticipated pivot followed an all-out fight against inflation the central bank launched two years ago. Eleven of 12 Fed voters backed the cut, which will bring the […]
Inflation slowed down on an annual basis in August, with the Consumer Price Index rising by 2.5 percent compared to a year ago. This is a noticeable drop from July’s 2.9 percent and a significant decline from the peak of 9.1 percent seen in 2022. Next week, Federal Reserve officials are expected to lower interest […]
By Michael Mackenzie and Liz Capo McCormick Bond traders are piling into bets that the US economy is on the verge of deteriorating so quickly that the Federal Reserve will need to start easing monetary policy aggressively — potentially before their next scheduled meeting — to head off a recession. Previous worries about the risk of elevated inflation have virtually disappeared, swiftly […]
By Catarina Saraiva and Ananya Chag Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago President Austan Goolsbee emphasized the central bank will not overreact to any one report, adding policymakers will get a lot of data prior to the Fed’s next meeting. Goolsbee, who spoke on the heels of the release of a weaker-than-expected employment report, said it’s the Fed’s job to figure out […]
By Jeanna Smialek What to know about the Fed’s decision. Federal Reserve officials left interest rates unchanged in their June decision and predicted that they will cut borrowing costs just once before the end of 2024, a sign that they plan to be patient before turning a corner in their fight against rapid inflation. Central bankers lifted interest rates […]
BY CHRISTOPHER RUGABER WASHINGTON (AP) — After several unexpectedly high inflation readings, Federal Reserve officials concluded at a meeting earlier this month that it would take longer than they previously thought for inflation to cool enough to justify reducing their key interest rate, now at a 23-year high. Minutes of the May 1 meeting, released Wednesday, showed that […]
By Grant Welker It’s not just inflation, and it’s not just a matter of perception: the cost of buying a home in Boston has far surpassed the increase in wages in the past 50 years, according to a new analysis. In Boston, a typical wage in 1970 was $9,133, according to a report this spring by […]
By Ben Casselman The U.S. economy remained resilient early this year, with a strong job market fueling robust consumer spending. The trouble is that inflation was resilient, too. Gross domestic product, adjusted for inflation, increased at a 1.6 percent annual rate in the first three months of the year, the Commerce Department said on Thursday. That was […]
By Paul Krugman Do you remember the economy of the late 1990s? Or if you’re too young to remember it — I hope that’s true for at least some of my readers — what have you heard about it? You probably remember it as a time of prosperity — low unemployment and rapid economic growth combined […]
