According to statistics released Thursday morning by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), consumers in Westchester have faced lower price increases on a percentage basis than consumers in some other areas of the country.
The BLS reported that consumer prices in the New York-Newark-Jersey City area went up 0.5% in May from where they had been in April and were up 3.2% from a year ago.
Those figures were lower than what the BLS reported for some other parts of the country. Cities across the U.S. averaged a 0.8% increase in prices from April to May of this year while the increase from May of 2020 was 5%. The southern U.S. as a whole saw a 0.7% increase in prices in May of this year and a 5.6% increase from May of last year. In the western U.S., there was a 1% increase in May of this year and a 4.7% increase from May of 2020. The mountain states saw a 1.3% increase in prices in May and showed a 5.2% increase over May of last year.
The BLS reporting shows the cost of energy went up 2.4% in the New York-Newark-Jersey City area from where it had been in April and is up 20.3% from where it had been a year ago. Gasoline was up 4.2% in May from where it had been in April, while there was a dramatic 41.2% increase from where the price of gasoline had been a year ago.
Costs in May for motor vehicles were up 1.4% over April. The increase from a year ago was reported as being 12.8%. Costs for used cars and trucks rose 6.6% from April to May, up 29.6% over a year ago.
There was a modest 0.1% increase in costs for medical care in May, compared with a 1% increase from where they had been in May of 2020.
The food index in the New York-Newark-Jersey City area was unchanged in May. A 0.3% increase in prices for food consumed away from home was generally offset by a 0.2% decline in at-home food prices.