In 2022, Americans are dealing with sky-high inflation, which hit a 40-year high earlier this year. Though inflation has started to slow slightly due to factors like the Federal Reserve rate hikes, the year-over-year inflation rate was still a whopping 8.2% in September. This high inflation is driven by a variety of factors, including the continued presence of the COVID-19 pandemic, the war in Ukraine and labor shortages. And High inflation in Tampa Bay is one of the highest in the country.
The government is hoping to continue to rein in inflation with additional aggressive interest rate hikes this year, but exactly how much of an effect that will have remains to be seen.
Related: Report Shows Buyer’s Market By The End of 2023
Inflation is rising more quickly in some places than others, though. In order to determine the cities where inflation is rising the most – and thus is the biggest problem – WalletHub compared 23 major MSAs (Metropolitan Statistical Areas) across two key metrics related to the Consumer Price Index, which measures inflation. We compared the Consumer Price Index for the latest month for which BLS data is available to two months prior and one year prior to get a snapshot of how inflation has changed in the short and long term.
Ask the Experts
In order to shed more light on inflation and what it means for our economy, WalletHub turned to a panel of experts.
- What are the main factors currently driving inflation?
- Since inflation hit a 40-year high of 9.1% earlier this year, what can be done to slow down the rapidly increasing price gains?
- Is raising interest rates a good or bad solution to control inflation?
- What does the current inflation rate tell us about the future of the economy?
Methodology
In order to determine the cities where inflation is rising the most, WalletHub compared 23 MSAs (Metropolitan Statistical Areas) across two key metrics involving the Consumer Price Index, which measures inflation. We’ve listed the metrics below, along with their corresponding weights. We then determined each MSA’s weighted average across the metrics and used the resulting scores to rank-order our sample.
For each MSA in the sample, we used the latest data available from the Bureau of Labor Statistics. For some MSAs, there is a one-month lag on the data available.
- Consumer Price Index Change (Latest month vs 2 months before): Full Weight (~50.00 Points)
- Consumer Price Index Change (Latest month vs 1 year ago): Full Weight (~50.00 Points)
Sources: Data for these rankings came from U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.
Story attributed to Study Finds.
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