40 years? The part I posted is showing about 10 years. Where the last three have far far exceeded normal target inflation. Sure, it could be worse. But this is still shit.
I was going off of the info at the top of the graph: "Aug 2023: 306.269 | Index 1982-1984=100"
So yeah, ~3% for 40 years is about right. Last three years are way higher though, so the average is not a good indicator of recent inflation. Last 3 years is probably around 6% per year, which is pretty bad.
I think it's a little lower, between 17-19%. Average hourly wage has increased about 10% during that time period. Couldn't find median which would show an bleaker picture. Not to mention the general problems with CPI.
Yeah, it misses a lot of cases because average is gonna flatten a lot.
Like I had a run of good raises where I ended up making out well above that 10% increase in pay due to changing jobs, but at the same time average rent doubled, food prices went up 25% on average, and the fact that per squarefoot rentals have gone down added storage costs to my life because everytime we have to move we're paying more for less space.