2023
January
30
Monday

Monitor Daily Podcast

January 30, 2023
Error loading media: File could not be played
 
00:0000:0000:00
00:00
Laurent Belsie
Senior Economics Writer

I broke a personal rule the other day at the grocery store: I stocked up on pasta at $1.19 a package. For a year I’d bought the staple only as needed, telling myself the dollar-a-box sales would return once things settle down. But on that shopping day, I realized the world would never return to its pre-inflation normal.

My capitulation was complete: spaghetti, elbow macaroni, the works.

Inflation is not the worst economic problem a nation can have (unless it really gets bad). Depression hits people harder. So does spreading unemployment. And yet inflation sticks in the public craw as almost nothing else does.

Nearly half of Americans point to economic issues, particularly inflation, as the country’s top problem, far ahead of immigration (11%), gun violence and crime (6%), and government spending and taxes (6%), according to a CNN poll released last week.

Such fears are overblown, economists point out. Pay tends to go up with inflation, as do home prices, while the real value of one’s debts goes down. The appreciation of our house in the past three years should help me pay for all the buck-nineteen pasta I could ever want.

Tomorrow the Federal Reserve’s policy committee will begin a two-day meeting to decide how much more to raise interest rates to curb that inflation. Many economists say more rate hikes are needed, given that inflation remains stubbornly high at a 5% annualized rate.

Yet even if food prices are notoriously volatile (don’t get me started about eggs!) some key trends are positive. On Friday, the central bank’s most-trusted inflation measure fell for the third time in a row. And it’s looking possible that America’s inflation surge will be contained without a recession – or breaking my pasta budget.


You've read 3 of 3 free articles. Subscribe to continue.

Today’s stories

And why we wrote them

Gerald Herbert/AP
Protesters march Saturday in Memphis, Tennessee, over the death of Tyre Nichols, who died after being beaten by police.
Melanie Stetson Freeman/Staff
Dora Lopez gets a hug from lead outreach worker Zaida Adams at Mutual Aid Eastie’s community space, Jan. 25, 2023, in East Boston. Ms. Lopez, who was unable to work during medical treatments, sought help filling out forms for housing support. Members of Mutual Aid sat down with Ms. Lopez’s landlord to work out rent issues.

The Explainer

Points of Progress

What's going right

In Pictures

Melanie Stetson Freeman/Staff
A street vendor sells elote, or grilled corn, in the main plaza in San Miguel de Allende, Mexico. Street food has long been a staple of Mexican communities.

The Monitor's View

AP
J. Lawrence Turner, pastor of Mississippi Boulevard Christian Church, speaks to a reporter at City Hall in response to the investigation of the death of Tyre Nichols.

A Christian Science Perspective

About this feature

A message of love

Valentyn Ogirenko/Reuters
An image by the street artist Tvboy catches the imagination of Anastasia, a young resident of Bucha, Ukraine, on Jan. 29, 2023. The Italian artist created a number of murals during a visit to Ukraine to offer hope and uplift to residents hard hit by the war.
( The illustrations in today’s Monitor Daily are by Karen Norris. )

A look ahead

That’s a wrap for the news. Tune in tomorrow when we look at why South Korea is considering building its own nuclear bomb. 

More issues

2023
January
30
Monday
CSM logo

Why is Christian Science in our name?

Our name is about honesty. The Monitor is owned by The Christian Science Church, and we’ve always been transparent about that.

The Church publishes the Monitor because it sees good journalism as vital to progress in the world. Since 1908, we’ve aimed “to injure no man, but to bless all mankind,” as our founder, Mary Baker Eddy, put it.

Here, you’ll find award-winning journalism not driven by commercial influences – a news organization that takes seriously its mission to uplift the world by seeking solutions and finding reasons for credible hope.

Explore values journalism About us