President Biden still can’t get a grip on inflation

Oil prices have been falling steeply, reducing prices at the pumps. Wheat prices have dropped as supplies from Ukraine start to hit the world market again. And supply chains are steadily getting back to normal as trade routes recover from the pandemic, with shipping costs back down to their level at the start of the year. So when the US inflation figures were published today, the markets expected both headline and core rates to be coming back down. But – yikes – they were disappointed. Instead, prices are still climbing – and it is becoming more and more clear that President Biden’s wild spending is the real problem.

The inflation numbers out of the US today are, once again, alarming. Instead of the minor but steady fall most economists were forecasting, the headline CPI rate has risen by 0.1 to 8.3 per cent, while the core rate, which excludes volatile fuel and energy prices, was up by 6.3