In rural southwest Illinois, fourth generation grocery store owner Craig Norrenberns said his three shops across the region are “fighting the price battle.” “There’s no doubt that people are having to watch their wallets a little bit closer,” Norrenberns said. A head of lettuce is a good example. What normally costs $1 soared as high as $5 several times in the past couple months, he said. … the grocery’s most rural store in Red Bud, Illinois, is in an area not included in the Consumer Price Index, the most widely used tool to measure inflation in the U.S. The Bureau of Labor Statistics only surveys counties that include a metro or micropolitan area — a county without a town of at least 10,000 people is left out. At the same time, rural residents may be hardest hit by rising prices for groceries, gas, healthcare and heating, said University of Wisconsin-Madison economics professor Tessa Conroy, who co-authored an editorial on the issue earlier this month. “When we look at the categories where prices are going up, those are categories where rural communities tend to spend more,” Conroy said. The limitations of the Consumer Price Index stem from its creation and resources, according to Steve Reed, an economist at the BLS.
Source: KCUR News
