Over the past year, consumers have struggled amid high food prices due to surging inflation and supply chain disruptions. However, the Fed’s aggressive rate hikes have slowed price rises as inflation eased for the third consecutive month in December. The Consumer Price Index (CPI) increased by 6.5% over the last year.
A slowing inflation essentially led to a decline in interest rate hikes as the Fed raised the short-term interest rates for the eighth time since last year by a quarter of a percentage point. However, the economy added more jobs in January than expected.
