Atlanta area ranked 20th for inflation impact among major US metro areas
A new study looking at the effects of inflation on major metropolitan statistical areas found Atlanta was ranked 20th.
However, while it's a big number, the study by WalletHub said that means the impacts to the city were actually lower than the rest of the areas in the peer group.
The most recent measure of inflation in the United States was 2.8% in February, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics' Consumer Price Index.
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To get to the bottom of which major metros were feeling the price of inflation the hardest, WalletHub compared them across the CPI's changes in the past two months compared to changes in the past year.
For Atlantans, the data showed they'd seen a 0.7% increase in costs in the past two months and 2.1% in the past year, since February 2024.
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By those measures, Atlanta was near the bottom in terms of actual impacts on consumers by price changes.
For where Americans are seeing costs rise the most, it's predominantly in housing.
"Shelter costs have been a big driver of inflation. Rents spiked after Covid, and it's taken a long time for them to decelerate," Dr. William Kuttner, Williams College professor of economics, said. 'Partly that's because it's hard-wired into the data: the rent component of the CPI includes all existing leases, and so it will stay high for some time even as rents on new leases fall."
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