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PCE stands for Personal Consumption Expenditures. Those numbers come from the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA)
CPI stands for Consumer Price Index. Those numbers come from the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS)
The key difference is the PCE includes prices paid on behalf of consumers (e.g. Medicare and Medicaid), whereas the CPI only contains prices directly paid by consumers.
The PCE tends to overweight medical expenses while the CPI tends to overweight rent.
The Fed’s preferred measure of inflation is PCE.
CPI and PCE Both Seriously Flawed
Neither measure directly incorporates home prices. Economists explain this away by stating homes are a capital expense.
OK, so what? The fact is, rising home prices (asset prices in general), are a direct reflection of inflation.
By ignoring asset prices, the Fed helped blow the biggest economic bubble yet. Now the Fed struggles to contain the serious inflation it helped create.
Author(s): Mike Shedlock
Publication Date: 30 May 2022
Publication Site: Mish Talk