For the past several years, the Federal Reserve has repeatedly stated that inflation in the United States remains consistently below the central bank's official target of 2%. However, this is dramatically different from what the average person on the street is experiencing. These individuals represent the largest group of consumers in America and thus the much higher inflation rates that they are experiencing in their daily lives will directly impact the ability of Americans to consume.
One of the problems with the core inflation measures that the Federal Reserve Bank uses to determine monetary policy is that these numbers exclude items such as food or energy. However, for the average person, these items consume a substantial portion of their budgets. While energy prices have come down dramatically over the past twelve months, food prices have not. In fact, as Michael Snyder at The Economic Collapse Blog points out...