U.S. wholesale prices were unchanged last month in another sign that inflation is returning to something close to normal after years of pressuring America’s households in the wake of COVID-19.
The Labor Department reported Friday that its producer price index—which tracks inflation before it hits consumers—didn’t move from August to September after rising 0.2% the month before. Measured from a year earlier, the index rose 1.8% in September, the smallest such rise since February and down from a 1.9% year-over-year increase in August.
Excluding food and energy prices, which tend to fluctuate from month to month, so-called core wholesale prices rose 0.2% from August and 2.8% from a year earlier, up from the previous month’s 2.6% increase.
The wholesale prices of services rose modestly but were offset by a drop in the price of goods, including a 5.6% August-to-September decline in the wholesale price of gasoline.
The wholesale inflation data arrived one day after the government said consumer prices rose just 2.4% in September from 12 months earlier—the mildest year-over-year rise since February 2021. That was barely above the Federal Reserve’s 2% target and far below inflation’s four-decade high of 9.1% in mid-2022. Still, with the presidential election less than a month away, many Americans remain unhappy with consumer prices, which remain well above where they were before the inflationary surge began in 2021.
