Household inflation experiences in the U.S.: a comprehensive approach

Bart Hobijn, Kristin Mayer, Carter Stennis and Giorgio Topa

No 2009-19, Working Paper Series from Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco

Abstract: We present new measures of household-specific inflation experiences based on comprehensive information from the Consumer Expenditure Survey (CEX). We match households in the Interview and the Diary Surveys from the CEX to produce both complete and detailed pictures of household expenditures. The resulting household inflation measures are based on a more accurate and detailed description of household expenditures than those previously available. We find that our household-based inflation measures track aggregate measures such as the CPI-U quite well and that the addition of Diary Survey data induces small but significant differences in the measurement of household inflation. The distribution of inflation experiences across households exhibits a large amount of dispersion over the entire sample period. In addition, we uncover a significantly negative relationship between mean inflation and inflation inequality across households.

Keywords: Inflation (Finance); Households - Economic aspects (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2009
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-cba, nep-mac and nep-mon
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (5)

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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:fip:fedfwp:2009-19

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