Inflation a ‘Huge Problem,’ Democrat House Leader Admits

In the latest Democrat acknowledgment of America’s cost-of-living squeeze, House Majority Leader Rep. Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) told Fox News that red-hot inflation is a “huge problem” for households.

Hoyer made the remarks in an interview on Fox News’ “Your World” program that aired on July 20.

“Inflation is a huge problem. It’s a huge problem for Americans. Supply shortages—particularly in grocery stores—a huge problem for Americans. We need to deal with that,” the Democrat leader said.

The remarks follow a recent admission by White House economic adviser Jared Bernstein that inflation in the United States is “unacceptably high,” although there’s some improvement in areas like gas prices, which Bernstein said were “moving in the right direction.”

After hitting a record-high of more than $5 a gallon last month, gasoline prices have trended downward, with the automotive association AAA reporting that, on July 21, the national average was $4.44 per gallon.

Hoyer insisted that the Biden administration was working to tame soaring inflation, touting such measures as the recently passed Lower Food and Fuel Costs Act, which Washington-based think tank R Street Institute panned as exacerbating “the very problems it claims to solve,” while also adding $700 million of public debt.

Rural Households Hit Harder by Inflation

The latest inflation print came in at a multi-decade high of 9.1 percent in annual terms, with food up 10.4 percent and energy a whopping 41.6 percent.

While price inflation affects all American consumers, recent studies from Iowa State University and the New York Federal Reserve Bank showed that different spending patterns among different demographics means that the inflationary wave has had a disproportionate impact.

Rural households, for example, have been hit harder by soaring inflation, with the Iowa State University study showing that rural discretionary incomes have plunged by 50 percent since 2020, with