Consumer Prices and Price Indexes

WWC snapshot of http://stats.bls.gov/cpandpi.htm taken on Sat Jun 10 19:48:39 1995

This program provides measures of price change for a representative fixed market basket of consumer goods and services.

Measures of price change for two population groups-all urban consumers (CPI-U) and urban wage earners and clerical workers (CPI-W).
Monthly indexes for U.S. city average and the 5 largest metropolitan areas, 4 geographic regions, 4 population size classes, and 13 region-by-size group-all-items index and major commodity and service groups and subgroups.
Bimonthly indexes for 10 metropolitan areas, semiannual average indexes for 12 metropolitan areas, and annual average indexes for 2 metropolitan area-all-items index and major commodity and service groups and subgroups.
Monthly indexes for selected individual commodities and services, U.S. city average.
Monthly average retail prices of food, U.S. city average and four regions.
Monthly average retail prices of piped gas, electricity, gasoline, and fuel oil, U.S. average and selected areas.

CPI-U: Fixed market basket of 364 entry level items representing all goods and services purchased for everyday living by all urban residents. Covers about 80 percent of the total civilian noninstitutional population including, in addition to wage earners and clerical workers, professional, managerial, and technical workers, short-term workers, the self-employed, the unemployed. and retirees and others not in the labor force.
CPl-W: Fixed market basket of 364 entry level items representing all goods and services purchased for everyday living by urban wage earners and clerical workers. Covers about 32 percent of the total civilian noninstitutional population.

Sample of 57,000 rental units and 19,000 retail/service outlets, 85 areas in sample.
Food, rent, utilities, and a few other items priced monthly in all areas; most other commodities and services priced monthly in the 5 largest areas, bimonthly in other areas.
Most pricing by personal interview; some by telephone.
Items priced and weights based on 1982-84 survey of expenditure patterns of consumers.

Monthly news release-The Consumer Price Index-about 2 weeks after reference month. Electronic access available.
Monthly periodical-CPI Detailed Report-early in second month after reference month. Selected indexes also in Monthly Labor Review.
Data files on tape-available day of news release covering all published indexes and average prices for household and motor fuels and some fuel items.
Historical data in Handbook of Labor Statistics.
Data files on diskette.

Primary measure of price change at consumer level.
Indicator of inflationary trends in economy.
Measure of purchasing power of consumer dollar.
Formulation and evaluation of economic policy measures.
Adjustment of payments under many government programs, including payments to Social Security beneficiaries, retired military and Federal civil service employees and survivors, and other recipients of transfer payments.
Adjustment of rental lease agreements, payments from trust funds and wills, etc.
Deflation of earnings to provide a measure of real earnings.
Factor in collective bargaining and wage and pension adjustments
Indexes measure only relative rates of change in area price levels; area indexes are not to be used as measures of differences in living costs between areas.
Adjustments to the income tax structure-tax exemptions and brackets based upon the change in the CPI-U. Under the Economic Recovery Tax Act of 1981, these adjustments are designed to prevent inflation caused tax rate increases and were reflected initially in the 1985 tax schedules.

Testing computer-aided personal and telephone interviewing methods for improving productivity and quality of the data collection process.
Examining random digit dialing methods for developing the sampling frame for the Point-of-Purchase Survey.
Conducting systematic re-interviews of the data collection process to identity sources of measurement error.
Testing the use of regression methods of adjustment for quality change in market basket items.