News Summary

• Consumers' frustration over the erosion of their purchasing power continues to mount.
• Inflation has exceeded wage growth for four straight months.
• Even though inflation is down from its post-COVID peak, it's still above historical norms.
• The long-running impact of that spike is still being felt in Americans' wallets years later."Americans are literally paying the price for high inflation through elevated price levels," Mark Hamrick, chief economic analyst at The Hamrick Brief, told Business Insider.
• "Even if you're making more money numbers-wise, with the way prices are rising, you have less money left over at the end of the month," ZipRecruiter economist Nicole Bachaud said.