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Consumer Price Index (CPI)

Also called CPI.

A BLS measure of the average change over time in the prices urban consumers pay for a market basket of goods and services.

BLS publishes it monthly. It's the most widely used measure of inflation, and it's also used to adjust payments such as Social Security and to index federal tax brackets. Source 1 Source 2

The headline index is the CPI-U. See How CPI is measured.

Related terms

Where it comes up

Sources

  1. Bureau of Labor Statistics: Consumer Price Indexes overview (opens in a new tab)
  2. Bureau of Labor Statistics: Consumer Price Index frequently asked questions (opens in a new tab)

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