True cost of living – The Burning Platform

Authored by Katabella Roberts via The Epoch Times,

Americans are set to fork out an extra $11,500 this year if they want to enjoy the same standard of living they maintained in 2020, according to new estimates from NerdWallet.

The estimates, published in August, were based on inflation and annual spending data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS). Analysts at NerdWallet looked at how spending would compare this year to 2020 when the COVID-19 pandemic began.

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Analysts said 2020 was the “last full year when inflation was relatively stable.” In that same year, the U.S. inflation rate was 1.23 percent.

As of August, inflation in the United States stands at 8.3 percent, according to data from BLS.

“In all of 2020, American households spent $61,300, on average,” according to analysts.

“This number includes everything we spend our money on: housing, food, entertainment, clothing, transportation, and everything else.”

“In 2022, it stands to reach $72,900, a difference of more than $11,500 if consumers want to maintain the same standard of living,” they wrote.

Continue reading “Inflation Costing Average American Family $11,500 This Year”

Guest Post by Eugene Ludwig

The ‘True Cost of Living’ index shows millions of low- and middle-income families don’t earn enough to buy necessities like shelter, food, and child care

For several years now, many of us have focused on the scourge of “fake news.” But much as we may blame avaricious social platforms and conniving public figures for driving widespread cynicism, we need to consider the role played by another more innocuous reality: misleading statistics.

Flagging confidence in both government and the mainstream media tracks decades in which official economic indicators—most notably those that purport to gauge the cost of living—have fundamentally failed to mirror middle-class reality.

Perhaps “fake” is too strong a term to describe the data-driven consumer price index (CPI), which serves as the U.S. government’s proxy for inflation. But the narrative the CPI has long burnished—namely that, since 2000, ordinary expenses have been fairly manageable amid rising wages—is entirely debunked by new research.

Continue reading “Inflation has been pummeling the middle class for decades, but the out-of-touch CPI masks this reality”