On Wednesday’s broadcast of NBC’s “MTP Now,” host Chuck Todd and NBC News Business and Data Reporter Brian Cheung discussed the latest inflation report and noted that prices aren’t falling, they’re just “going up by a slower rate,” and are “higher than pre-pandemic during the Trump administration as well.”
Todd said that while the report is “good” news, “It doesn’t mean that prices still aren’t going up. They are.”
He added, “The good news is, prices are going up slower. This doesn’t mean prices have somehow dipped below where they were say, two years ago at this time.”
Cheung responded, “[P]rices are still going up. They’re just going up by a slower rate, which implies that some things are getting cheaper, while other things are still getting more expensive.”
He added that costs increased for the month for food, energy, and “shelter, which is the largest cost for most Americans, just the cost of putting a roof over your head.”
Cheung further noted that while prices for eggs, milk, and gas have fallen while prices for bread have risen since June 2022, “but if we now take a look at January 2021, the inauguration of Joe Biden…you can see prices for all of these categories are still higher than they were at that time. Now, you can also say that it’s higher than pre-pandemic during the Trump administration as well.”
He concluded that, for the first time in years, year-over-year wage growth outpaced year-over-year inflation.
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