Emerging from pandemic lockdown is shaping up to be pricey
12 May 2021
Emerging from pandemic lockdown is shaping up to be pricey. Traveling, eating out and even refreshing your wardrobe costs more, per April inflation data out today.
Why it matters: The economy is reopening and suddenly Americans want in on the activities they've gone a year without. The data shows how much that sudden demand has helped push prices higher — at least for now.
Catch up quick: Year-over-year prices rose 4.2% — the steepest climb since 2008, Axios' Hope King reports. It's coming off the weaker readings from last year when the pandemic hit.
- On a monthly basis, the index rose 0.8%, much higher than the 0.2% economists expected.
- A historic surge in used car and truck prices accounted for more than a third of the increase: Prices last month jumped the most (+10%) in the index's 68-year history, thanks to the chip shortage that's zapped car supply.
Other categories with "unprecedented" monthly increases, per Barclays: lodging away from home (+8%) and airline fares (+10%).
- The apparel index — clothes, shoes, jewelry — rose 0.3%, its first bump since January. Food away from home continued to rise last month, but so did food at home.
- The surge is "unlikely to be sustained," says Michael Gapen, Barclays' chief economist.
The big question critical to the timeline for fuller economic recovery is how long the higher prices spurred by more demand — or higher input costs caused by a growing list of shortages passed along to consumers — stick around.
Transcripts show George Floyd told police "I can't breathe" over 20 times
Section2Newly released transcripts of bodycam footage from the Minneapolis Police Department show that George Floyd told officers he could not breathe more than 20 times in the moments leading up to his death.
Why it matters: Floyd's killing sparked a national wave of Black Lives Matter protests and an ongoing reckoning over systemic racism in the United States. The transcripts "offer one the most thorough and dramatic accounts" before Floyd's death, The New York Times writes.
The state of play: The transcripts were released as former officer Thomas Lane seeks to have the charges that he aided in Floyd's death thrown out in court, per the Times. He is one of four officers who have been charged.
- The filings also include a 60-page transcript of an interview with Lane. He said he "felt maybe that something was going on" when asked if he believed that Floyd was having a medical emergency at the time.
What the transcripts say:
- Floyd told the officers he was claustrophobic as they tried to get him into the squad car.
- The transcripts also show Floyd saying, "Momma, I love you. Tell my kids I love them. I'm dead."
- Former officer Derek Chauvin, who had his knee on Floyd's neck for over eight minutes, told Floyd, "Then stop talking, stop yelling, it takes a heck of a lot of oxygen to talk."
Read the transcripts via DocumentCloud.