White House on PCE Inflation Increase: ‘Nice to Hit the Expectations’ — Expect ‘Bumpy Path Down’ to Target Rate

On Friday’s broadcast of Bloomberg’s “Balance of Power,” White House Council of Economic Advisers Chair Jared Bernstein reacted to the March PCE report that showed the yearly PCE inflation rate increasing with the annual core rate holding steady along with 0.3% monthly growth in both overall and core PCE, the same as it was in February, by stating that “It was nice to hit the expectations number for the PCE, both headline and core, this morning.” And said that “we expect inflation to continue a bumpy path down towards target.”

Bernstein stated that improvements in consumer sentiment have “tracked some of the improvements that we saw in inflation, especially the disinflation in the latter half of last year. Now, look, inflation is still down 60% from its peak. It was nice to hit the expectations number for the PCE, both headline and core, this morning.”

He added, “When it comes to inflation, I think the question there…is, are the forces that helped with the disinflation in the second half of this year, are they just on a break or are they gone? And obviously, we’ve argued that they’re still there, and that we expect inflation to continue a bumpy path down towards target.”

Follow Ian Hanchett on Twitter @IanHanchett