Readin' this stuff just hurts my lil ole head, but from what I can see, without the criminal penalty being picked up by smokers for the cigarette Big Cigars, The CPI would have decreased 1.475%, no?
And the CPI less food and energy would have risen just .075, after rising .2% for each of the previous four months. Right?
Now I don't recall all the good stuff I've read about this subject in the ever lucid LBO, but the phrase 'screeching halt' jumped into my head.
This is significant stuff, eh?
pms
>BLS DAILY REPORT, THURSDAY, JANUARY 14, 1999
>
>RELEASED TODAY:
> CPI -- The CPI-U rose 0.1 percent in December, on a seasonally adjusted
>basis, following increases of 0.2 percent in each of the preceding 2 months.
>The food index was unchanged in December, after advancing 0.1 percent in
>November. ... The energy index, which was unchanged in November, fell 1.4
>percent in December. ... Excluding food and energy, the CPI-U increased 0.3
>percent in December, following increases of 0.2 percent in each of the
>preceding four months. Three-fourths of the December rise in the index for
>all items less food and energy was accounted for by a 18.8 percent rise in
>the index for cigarettes, reflecting the pass-through to retail of the
>45-cents-a pack wholesale price increase announced by major tobacco
>companies in late November. ...
>