Former President Trump has said that inflation is among the top issues that will help him decide if he will run for the GOP nomination in 2024.
Increasing prices have been a fixture of the covid-era recovery, with labor and supply problems converging with strong demand to boost inflation.
During his interview with Yahoo Finance, Donald Trump zeroed in on increasing energy prices, with crude recently nearing $80 per barrel. Then on Monday, oil futures went to their highest spot since 2014.
“And it is very scary when you see gasoline go from $1.87 per gallon when I was in D.C., it went from $1.87 and now it is more than $5 and it could go a lot higher,” Trump said.
Although gas prices are much higher than when Trump was in office, new data reveals the price of gas is lower than what he claimed. AAA’s daily price shows the average price for gas was $3.19 per gallon on Oct. 3, and $4.40 in the state of California — where gas almost always costs more than any other state.
Still, Trump echoed new concerns about increasing prices. Headline prices are higher by 5.3% y/y, while supply chain issues and labor shortages are pushing them even higher.
Core prices have gone up at a somewhat slower rate — but a 25% y/y spike in energy prices is working like a tax on consumers just before the holiday season. Oil futures have doubled since 2020, pushing prices higher.
“It seems to me like inflation will ravage our country,” Trump said to Yahoo Finance.
The Fed’s Open Market Committee says much of the pressures we are seeing are temporary, but has lifted its inflation prediction for 2021 to 4.2%. The central bank linked this uptick to supply chain problems as the United States and world economies recover from the coronavirus pandemic.
“The combination of stronger demand and bottlenecks has caused inflation to run well over targets,” Fed Chairman Jay Powell recently said during a panel talk with other financial leaders from around the globe.
Former President Donald Trump expects the price of oil and gas to keep going up, “What it is going to be one year from now, I believe it will be much higher than” current levels, he predicted.
Author: Blake Ambrose