From the beginning of 2022 to its conclusion, many consumers experienced financial hardship and expected a Stimulus Check. And inflation is a significant factor in many ways.
Before 2022, many people had little savings and often lived on Stimulus checks. As a result, many people had to rely on credit cards last year to pay their essential obligations.
Many governments stepped up and gave stimulus cheques to eligible people in 2022 because conditions became so difficult. However, the general population was not given access to government stimulus check funding. A federal stimulus program for the first half of 2023 also looks improbable at this moment. In fact, there’s a significant likelihood that in 2023 we won’t receive any federal stimulus funding at all.
Stimulus Checks Are A Dream
Perhaps it’s not the news that shoppers on a tight budget want to hear. But not all of the news is bad. For the month of December, the Bureau of Labor Statistics has just issued inflation figures. And it might bring a lot of people relief. For the first time in over three years, the rate of inflation from one month to the next decreased in December. In comparison to November, the Consumer Price Index (CPI), which tracks changes in the price of consumer goods, fell 0.1% in December. The index last had a monthly decline in May 2020.
In the meantime, inflation’s annual rate decreased from 7.1% in November to 6.5% in December. Since May 2021, that represents the smallest yearly gain.
To be clear, a 6.5% annual inflation rate is still extraordinarily high by historical standards. The Federal Reserve really intends to keep raising interest rates until inflation starts to inch closer to the 2% threshold, which is more in keeping with annual inflation’s appearance before the epidemic.
