--- title: Inflation Just Hit a 40-Year High, but Some Essentials Are Finally Getting Cheaper description: Consumer inflation rose to a 40-year high of 7% year over year in December 2021, while gas prices and meat prices started to get cheaper. authors: - name: Sarah Hansen role: Senior Writer url: https://money.com/author/sarah-hansen/ bio: Sarah Hansen is a senior writer at Money covering all things personal finance. Previously, she covered economic policy and capital markets on the breaking news desk at Forbes. education: Northwestern University, New York University at_money_since: 2021 articles: 347 covers: - Economy and Politics - Banking - Business - Career Advice - Credit - Credit Cards - Education - Health and Wellness - Housing - Insurance - Investing - Lifestyle - Loans - Mortgages - Personal Finance - Professional Services - Retirement - Shopping - Taxes social: - https://www.linkedin.com/in/sarah-m-hansen/ former_staff: true published: '2022-01-12T16:36:52.000Z' modified: '2024-01-10T17:09:38.000Z' section: Economy and Politics tags: - car prices - cars - inflation word_count: 402 canonical: https://money.com/inflation-gas-meat-car-prices/ type: Article source: structured-blocks --- > **Disclosure:** We research all brands listed and may earn a fee from our partners. Research and financial considerations may influence how brands are displayed. Not all brands are included. [Learn more](https://money.com/page/disclaimer/). ![Woman shopping for meat at the supermarket](https://img.money.com/2022/01/News-Inflation-Some-Essentials-Are-Cheaper-2.jpg) Consumer prices rose 7% over the past year — the highest inflation rate in nearly four decades. At the same time, though, certain everyday purchases like gas, pork, steak and tomatoes finally began to get cheaper last month. New [data](https://www.bls.gov/news.release/pdf/cpi.pdf) released by the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) shows that some categories saw particularly large spikes in December compared to a year earlier. Energy prices rose 29%, and prices for used [cars and trucks](https://money.com/how-to-buy-a-car-in-2022/) rose 37% over a 12-month span, thanks to pandemic-induced [shortages](https://money.com/holiday-shortages-toys-turkey-wine/) and [supply chain snags](https://money.com/supply-chain-crisis-stocks/). On a monthly basis, prices ticked up 0.5% overall between November and December, a continuation of a long upward trend in 2021, but a smaller gain than the 0.8% spike previous month. The BLS said rising prices for shelter (including [rent prices](https://money.com/signs-its-time-to-stop-renting-and-buy/) and homeowner costs), used cars and trucks, and food were the biggest contributors to the growth in overall prices on a monthly basis. Prices in the shelter category rose 0.4% between November and December, while food prices jumped 0.5%. Prices for new cars nudged up 1% for the month, and used car prices increased a steep 3.5%, after rising 2.5% in each of the two preceding months. Grocery prices rose 6.5% over the year ending in December, driven by a 12.5% spike in meat, poultry, fish and egg prices. The report noted that the prices in the “food at home” category had previously risen just 1.5% per year for the past decade. But even as consumer prices in general continue to climb, and are up significantly year over year**,** some goods are actually — *finally* — getting cheaper. Meat prices, which have been [soaring for months](https://money.com/meat-prices-rising-bacon-inflation/), fell 0.9% between November and December. Pork products including roasts and ribs saw a decline of 3.3% on the month, while beef steaks were down 2.6%. Some produce prices fell too, including oranges (down 1.1%) and tomatoes (down 4.6%). Prices for white bread fell 0.5% during the month. The price of gasoline also [ticked down](https://money.com/gas-prices-forecast-decrease-2022/) by half a percent last month, but that’s not cause for celebration just yet. Gas prices rose again slightly in January and are still up roughly 50% on a yearly basis, the BLS said. ```json { "@context": "https://schema.org", "@graph": [ { "@type": "BreadcrumbList", "@id": "https://money.com/inflation-gas-meat-car-prices/#breadcrumb", "itemListElement": [ { "@type": "ListItem", "position": 1, "name": "Home", "item": "https://money.com" }, { "@type": "ListItem", "position": 2, "name": "Economy and Politics", "item": "https://money.com/economy-and-politics/" }, { "@type": "ListItem", "position": 3, "name": "Inflation", "item": "https://money.com/inflation/" }, { "@type": "ListItem", "position": 4, "name": "Inflation Just Hit a 40-Year High, but Some Essentials Are Finally Getting Cheaper" } ] }, { "@type": "WebSite", "@id": "https://money.com/#website", "url": "https://money.com", "name": "Money", "publisher": { "@id": "https://money.com/#organization" } }, { "@type": "WebPage", "@id": "https://money.com/inflation-gas-meat-car-prices/#webpage", "url": "https://money.com/inflation-gas-meat-car-prices/", "name": "Inflation Just Hit a 40-Year High, but Some Essentials Are Finally Getting Cheaper", "isPartOf": { "@id": "https://money.com/#website" }, "datePublished": "2022-01-12T16:36:52.000Z", "mainEntity": { "@id": "https://money.com/inflation-gas-meat-car-prices/" }, "inLanguage": "en-US", "breadcrumb": { "@id": "https://money.com/inflation-gas-meat-car-prices/#breadcrumb" }, "dateModified": "2024-01-10T17:09:38.000Z" }, { "@type": "Article", "headline": "Inflation Just Hit a 40-Year High, but Some Essentials Are Finally Getting Cheaper", "articleSection": "Economy and Politics", "image": [ { "@type": "ImageObject", "url": "https://img.money.com/2022/01/News-Inflation-Some-Essentials-Are-Cheaper-2.jpg", "width": 1910, "height": 1273, "caption": "News-Inflation-Some-Essentials-Are-Cheaper" } ], "author": [ { "@type": "Person", "name": "Sarah Hansen", "url": "https://money.com/author/sarah-hansen/", "@id": "https://money.com/author/sarah-hansen/#author", "description": "Sarah Hansen is a senior writer at Money covering all things personal finance. 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