Brooks: America' s Inflation Is Worse Than Most of the World Due to Fed, Spending

On Friday’s “PBS NewsHour,” New York Times columnist David Brooks stated that while there is inflation taking place everywhere in the world, America’s inflation numbers are “significantly higher” than the numbers in most of the other comparable countries and this is due to both Federal Reserve policy and “our extremely expansionary fiscal policy, federal spending.”

Brooks stated, “Inflation is the number one concern in the country right now. And even though wages are going up, real wages are going down, that is, wages after accounting for inflation. And so, we’ve had several months now of negative wage — real wage growth. And so, that is a real problem. Now, it’s true that wages — or inflation is rising everywhere in the world, fuel everywhere in the world, food everywhere in the world. But the U.S. inflation rate is significantly higher than in most other comparable nations. And so, that has to be because of two things: One is Federal Reserve policy, but two is our extremely expansionary fiscal policy, federal spending. And so, that’s — I think that means that any further spending initiatives are going to be extremely unpopular and are probably not going to happen.”

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