Why the New York Fed asks ordinary folks where inflation is headed
Why the New York Fed asks ordinary folks where inflation is headed
It’s a big week for inflation data, with fresh readings on wholesale and consumer prices due Tuesday and Wednesday. But first, the New York Federal Reserve asked consumers to take a crack at forecasting where prices will be a year, three years and five years down the road.
The results of the Survey of Consumer Expectations: mixed, but mostly steady.
When consumers are asked to gauge future inflation, most extrapolate from recent purchases — what they shelled out on rent this month or to fill up their gas tank.
“Maybe you just came back from the grocery store,” said Jennifer Lee, a senior economist at BMO Capital Markets, “and you’re clouded from the view that you just paid a heck of a lot more for groceries than you did, like, a year ago.”
Or maybe you were half-listening to the evening news when you see a report about Fed Chair Jerome Powell saying this or that.
Consumers aren’t exactly making scientific predictions, but that’s not the point of asking them where they think prices are headed.
Mark Zandi, chief economist at Moody’s Analytics, said our expectations can be self-fulfilling. “When people think that inflation is going to be high in the future, then they’re gonna go to their employer and say, ‘Hey, you gotta pay me more,'” he said.
A key step in the dreaded wage-price spiral.
And when we expect inflation to cool, we hold off on spending. “Because you think, ‘Oh, gee, I’m gonna be able to buy that thing for a lower price in the future, so I’m just gonna wait,'” Zandi said.
That works to weaken demand and keep prices low.
Monday’s report from the New York Fed falls somewhere “between boring and a little, tiny bit cautionary, I’d say,” said Christine McDaniel, a senior research fellow at George Mason University’s Mercatus Center.
She said she saw some angst in consumers’ short-term forecast — they expect inflation will still be hovering around 3% a year from now. But the three-year outlook dropped to a historic low of 2.3%.
“We’re still in this slow, soft landing. Definitely not comfortable, you know, enough to take our seat belts off,” she said.
McDaniel added there’s good news for the Fed in the responses — consumers trust it’ll tame inflation eventually.
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