Alternate Inflation Charts

The CPI chart on the home page reflects our estimate of inflation for today as if it were calculated the same way it was in 1990. The CPI on the Alternate Data Series tab here reflects the CPI as if it were calculated using the methodologies in place in 1980. In general terms, methodological shifts in government reporting have depressed reported inflation, moving the concept of the CPI away from being a measure of the cost of living needed to maintain a constant standard of living.

Further definition is provided in our CPI Glossary. Further background on the SGS-Alternate CPI series is available in the Archives in the August 2006 SGS newsletter.

CPI Data Series (Subscription required.) View Download Excel CSV File Last Updated: August 13th, 2010

CPI Year-to-Year Growth

The CPI-U (consumer price index) is the broadest measure of consumer price inflation for goods and services published by the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS).

While the headline number usually is the seasonally-adjusted month-to-month change, the formal CPI is reported on a not-seasonally-adjusted basis, with annual inflation measured in terms of year-to-year percent change in the price index.

Here we show the annual percent change (year-to-year) in both the CPI-U and the SGS-Alternate CPI.

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