US inflation rose 3.7% in September — higher than economists predicted

Published

2 years ago

October 13, 2023

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US inflation rose 3.7% in September, more than economists expected and still well above the Federal Reserve’s 2% target, as the central bank weighs whether to hike interest rates again by year’s end.

The reading for the Consumer Price Index a closely watched measure of inflation that tracks changes in the costs of everyday goods and services matches the reading in August, and is slightly above the 3.6% advance that economists expected, according to data by the Bureau of Labor Statistics released Thursday.

On a monthly basis, inflation slowed to 0.4% from 0.6% in August, partly because of lower pressure from energy prices.

However, core CPI a number that excludes volatile food and energy prices and serves as a closely watched gauge among policymakers for long-term trends held steady at 0.3% month to month and rose 4.1% from a year ago, in line with expectations.

Though September’s CPI is also a cooldown from inflation’s 9.1% peak in June 2022, it still remains well above the Fed’s 2% goal. Stock futures dropped ahead of the market opening as traders increased their bets of another rate hike to around 50%, up from 30% earlier this week.

“The bigger picture is that the trend is still quite encouraging, but the fight continues,” said Olu Sonola, head of US regional economics at Fitch Ratings in New York. “They [Fed officials] may now want to extend the pause to December, given the recent increase in long-term rates.”

The gasoline index’s 2.1% advance was also a large contributor to the CPI, the data showed, though the federal agency said shelter’s 0.2% increase accounted for over half of the increase.

Gasoline experienced an eye-watering 10.6% increase last month, when AAA figures showed that the average price for a gallon of gas was $3.85.

As of Thursday, a gallon of gas in the US averages $3.65, according to AAA.

While many investors had been willing to look past the volatile energy numbers, a surprisingly resilient labor market has some worried that inflation could be more stubborn.

September’s employment report revealed that the US economy added a whopping 336,000 jobs last month — an unexpected surge that contradicts the notion the Fed may tamp down its aggressive tightening regime.

The blowout number was nearly double the 170,000 jobs economists had expected, and also sharply higher than an upwardly revised 227,000 jobs added in August, according to fresh data released by the Bureau of Labor Statistics last week.

The news sent yields on US Treasury bonds to their highest levels in 16 years and sent the Dow Jones Industrial Average into the red for 2023.

Since inflation hit a four-decade peak last summer, the central bank has worked to bring the stubborn figure down by hiking rates another 25 basis points to a 22-year high in August in hopes of an economic slowdown.

The benchmark federal funds rate currently sits between 5.25% and 5.5%. Last month, Fed officials unanimously decided to hold the record-high rate steady for the second time in six policy meetings so far this year.

But thanks to a strong labor market, the US economy has avoided a downturn, and even the Fed has said its no longer predicting the economy will slip into a recession by the end of the year.

“We must wait for more data to see if this is just a blip or if there is something more fundamental driving the increase such as higher rent increases in larger cities offsetting softer increases in smaller cities,” said US Bank of America Securities economist Stephen Juneau.

“When deciding whether to raise rates one last time this year, the FOMC will be asking whether inflation needs another nudge or if its getting to 2% on its own. Its increasingly looking like the latter,” NerdWallet data analyst Elizabeth Renter told The Post.

“The Fed, astheyreall too happy to remind us, is laser focused on getting inflation down to 2%.”

Fed Chair Jerome Powell has said central bankers will be taking a data-dependent approach moving forward, leaving more interest rate hikes before years end up in the air.

Markets were spooked ahead of the jobs report, falling more than 1% when the Labor Department released its Job Openings and Labor Turnover Summary, which showed job openings increased to 9.61 million in August up from 8.9 million in July.

With Post wires.

Politics

Resident doctors in England consider whether new offer is enough to call off five-day strike in run-up to Christmas

Published

44 mins ago

December 11, 2025

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Resident doctors in England consider whether new offer is enough to call off five-day strike in run-up to Christmas

Doctors in England planning to go on strike in the run-up to Christmas are considering a new offer from the government to end the long-running dispute.

Resident doctors, formerly junior doctors, will walk out from 7am on 17 December until 7am on 22 December.

Health Secretary Wes Streeting has appealed to doctors to accept the government’s latest package.

The British Medical Association (BMA) said it will consult members by surveying them online on whether or not the deal from the government is enough to call off next week’s walkout.

The poll will close on Monday – just two days before the five-day strike is set to start.

The union said the new offer includes new legislation to ensure UK medical graduates are prioritised for speciality training roles.

It also includes an increase in the number of speciality training posts over the next three years – from 1,000 to 4,000 – with more to start in 2026.

Funding for mandatory Royal College examination and membership fees for resident doctors is also part of the deal.

It does not address resident doctors’ demand for a 26% salary rise over the next few years to make up for the erosion in their pay in real terms since 2008 – this is on top of a 28.9% increase they have had over the last three years.

Mr Streeting warned a resident doctors’ strike over Christmas would have a “much different degree of risk” than previous walkouts.

It coincides with pressures facing the NHS, with health chiefs raising concerns over a “tidal wave” of illness and a “very nasty strain of flu”.

A new strain of the flu virus is thought to be much more infectious than previous strains and has already led to a record number of patients needing urgent hospital care.

The union’s mandate to strike is set to expire shortly, but Mr Streeting has offered to extend it to allow the medics to take action later in January if they reject his offer.

He called the union’s decision not to take it up “inexplicable”.

Last week, NHS England chief executive Sir Jim Mackey branded the decision by doctors to strike as “something that feels cruel” and which is “calculated to cause mayhem at a time when the service is really pulling all the stops out to try and avoid that and keep people safe”.

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BMA resident doctors committee chair Dr Jack Fletcher said the latest government offer “is the result of thousands of resident doctors showing that they are prepared to stand up for their profession and its future”.

“It should not have taken strike action, but make no mistake: it was strike action that got us this far,” he said.

“We have forced the government to recognise the scale of the problems and to respond with measures on training numbers and prioritisation.

“However, this offer does not increase the overall number of doctors working in England and does nothing to restore pay for doctors, which remains well within the government’s power to do.”

UK

Hundreds of ‘high-value’ artefacts stolen from museum in Bristol as police issue appeal

Published

1 hour ago

December 11, 2025

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Hundreds of 'high-value' artefacts stolen from museum in Bristol as police issue appeal

More than 600 artefacts have been stolen from a building housing items belonging to a museum in Bristol.

The items were taken from Bristol Museum’s British Empire and Commonwealth collection on 25 September, Avon and Somerset Police said.

The force described the burglary as involving “high-value” artefacts, as they appealed for the public’s help in identifying people caught on CCTV.

It is not clear why the appeal is being issued more than two months after the burglary occurred.

The break-in took place between 1am and 2am on Thursday 25 September when a group of four unknown males gained entry to a building in the Cumberland Road area of the city.

Detectives say they hope the four people on CCTV will be able to aid them with their enquiries.

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Politics

Poland resubmits vetoed crypto bill with ‘not even a comma’ changed

Published

1 hour ago

December 11, 2025

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Poland resubmits vetoed crypto bill with ‘not even a comma’ changed

Polish lawmakers have doubled down on crypto regulation rejected by President Karol Nawrocki, deepening tensions between the president and Prime Minister Donald Tusk.

Polska2050, part of the ruling coalition in the Sejm — Poland’s lower house of parliament — reintroduced the extensive crypto bill on Tuesday, just days after Nawrocki vetoed an identical bill.

The bill’s backers, including Adam Gomoła — a member of Poland2050 — called Bill 2050 an “improved” successor to the vetoed Bill 1424, but government spokesman Adam Szłapka reportedly declared that “not even a comma” had been changed.

The division over Poland’s crypto bill comes amid the rollout of the European Union’s Markets in Crypto-Assets Regulation (MiCA) across member states ahead of a July 2026 compliance deadline for EU crypto businesses.

Critics say Bill 2050 is “exactly same bill”

The new version of Poland’s draft crypto bill provides an 84-page-long document that essentially replicates the original Bill 1424, aiming to designate the Polish Financial Supervision Authority as the country’s primary crypto asset market regulator.

Crypto advocates like Polish politician Tomasz Mentzen previously criticized Bill 1424 as “118 pages of overregulation,” particularly in comparison to shorter versions in other EU member states like Hungary or Romania.

“The government has once again adopted exactly the same bill on cryptoassets,” Mentzen wrote in an X post on Tuesday.

He also mocked Tusk’s claim that the president’s earlier veto was tied to the alleged involvement of the “Russian mafia,” saying: “The bill is perfect, and anyone who thinks otherwise is funded by Putin.”

Government spokesman Szłapka reportedly claimed that Nawrocki will likely not veto the proposed bill this time, following a classified security briefing in parliament last week and “now has full knowledge” of the implications on national security.

The issue with MiCA: Local versus centralized EU oversight

Poland’s debate over its crypto bill sets an important precedent for implementing the EU-wide MiCA regulation, as the proposed legislation would place responsibility for market supervision on the local financial regulator.

The issue is particularly significant amid calls from some member states for more centralized MiCA supervision under the Paris-based European Securities and Markets Authority (ESMA).