Yes, the magnitude of year-on-year changes as drastically different, but eye-balling it, the directional correlation looks pretty high to me. Granted commodities are a small fraction of the our rich-world expenditures (not the case in poor countries where people spend 50+% of their income on food!); they are mostly wages and rent as Michael correctly points out. But it would also be worth looking back to before 1993, in particular the late 70s (a time of high commodity prices and high inflation), rather than acting as if 15 years of data from a single country proves the point beyond a shadow of a doubt.
Surging commodities ≠ inflation?
Paul Krugman doesn't think surging commodity prices will drive high inflation (and Michael Roberts agrees). I think they're probably right on balance, but I wish Krugman had plotted year-on-year commodity price and CPI changes on different axes in this graph:
Yes, the magnitude of year-on-year changes as drastically different, but eye-balling it, the directional correlation looks pretty high to me. Granted commodities are a small fraction of the our rich-world expenditures (not the case in poor countries where people spend 50+% of their income on food!); they are mostly wages and rent as Michael correctly points out. But it would also be worth looking back to before 1993, in particular the late 70s (a time of high commodity prices and high inflation), rather than acting as if 15 years of data from a single country proves the point beyond a shadow of a doubt.
Yes, the magnitude of year-on-year changes as drastically different, but eye-balling it, the directional correlation looks pretty high to me. Granted commodities are a small fraction of the our rich-world expenditures (not the case in poor countries where people spend 50+% of their income on food!); they are mostly wages and rent as Michael correctly points out. But it would also be worth looking back to before 1993, in particular the late 70s (a time of high commodity prices and high inflation), rather than acting as if 15 years of data from a single country proves the point beyond a shadow of a doubt.
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