When the US government finally released inflation data for November, it showed that price pressures had eased to their lowest level in four years. But many economists felt the numbers did not fully add up.
The report, released after a record-long government shutdown, showed sharp drops in areas that had stayed expensive for a long time. Housing costs, which account for about one-third of the consumer price index, appeared to cool suddenly. Prices for items such as airline tickets and clothing also fell noticeably.
Data gaps cast shadow over sharp drop in US Inflation
As is known, due to the shutdown, the Bureau of Labor Statistics was unable to gather price data through most of October and began collecting figures later than the usual time in November. As a result, core inflation, which leaves out food and energy prices, rose 2.6% in November compared with a year earlier. This was the slowest increase since 2021 and came in lower than all forecasts in a Bloomberg survey of economists.
Several analysts said the missing October data left large gaps in the report, which many read as if prices had not risen at all that month. This put strong downward pressure on the November inflation numbers. Some economists also warned that the shorter data collection window may have distorted the results, a Bloomberg report said.
Analysts call CPI report ‘delayed and patchy’
Stacey Standish, a spokesperson for the Bureau of Labor Statistics, told Bloomberg that the agency relied on a method known as carry-forward imputation for housing price metrics. Under this approach, prices are estimated using figures from the most recent period for which data was available, assuming there was no change.
As a result, rent data for October 2025 was taken from April 2025. This meant there was no change recorded in the rent index or in owners’ equivalent rent for October.
The economists were clear in describing the analysis which made their concerns quite evident. TD Securities called it “Lost in Translation.” William Blair described the report as “Delayed and Patchy,” while EY-Parthenon referred to it as a “Swiss Cheese CPI report.”
Stephen Stanley, chief US economist at Santander US Capital Markets, told Bloomberg that the report was unusual and full of irregular results, most of which moved in the same direction. He said the findings should not be ignored completely, but warned that it would be a mistake to accept them without question.
Because of the shutdown, the Bureau of Labor Statistics was unable to calculate normal month-to-month inflation figures. Instead, it mainly tracked price changes from September to November. In guidance released a day before the report, the agency cautioned that some of the data might not be fully reliable.
The BLS also noted that when inflation data is measured over two months and shows large swings, the estimates for the missing months should be treated with less confidence.
