Beyond the Numbers. Employment and Unemployment. Volume 1, Number 3. Prices and Spending. Energy Prices Jump while Food Prices Show Modest Increases.

摘要

The Consumer Price Index (CPI) is a measure of the average change over time in the prices paid by urban consumers for a market basket of consumer goods and services. Produced monthly by the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), the CPI uses a market basket, or a sample of goods and services that consumers purchase for day-to-day living, and weighs each item on the basis of the amount of spending reported by a sample of families and individuals. Widely used as a measure of inflation, the CPI provides information about price changes in the nations economy and can be used by government, business, labor, and private individuals as a guide to making economic decisions.