What CPI actually measures — and what it leaves out

When the news says 'inflation was 3.1% last year,' the number almost always comes from the Consumer Price Index for All Urban Consumers (CPI-U), published monthly by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. RaiseGauge uses this exact series to judge whether a raise kept up.

What's in the basket

BLS prices a fixed 'basket' of goods and services that a typical urban household buys, then tracks how the cost of that basket changes over time. The major groups are weighted by how much people actually spend on them:

• Shelter (rent and owners' equivalent rent) — the single largest weight, roughly a third of the index.
• Food, split into food at home (groceries) and food away from home.
• Energy — gasoline, electricity, and natural gas, the most volatile component.
• Transportation, including vehicles and motor fuel.
• Medical care, apparel, recreation, education, and communication.

What it leaves out — and why your number differs

CPI is an average across a representative population. Your personal inflation depends on what you buy. If you rent in a fast-rising metro, your shelter inflation may run well above the national figure; if you just bought a home with a fixed mortgage, far below it.

• Asset prices (stocks, the price of a house you already own) are not in CPI — it measures consumption, not investment.
• Quality adjustments: when a product improves, BLS may record part of a price rise as added value rather than inflation.
• Substitution: the basket is updated, but day-to-day it assumes you keep buying similar things.

This is why RaiseGauge also publishes metro and category pages: the national headline is a starting point, not the whole story for your situation.

Open the raise calculator to check your own numbers.

Updated July 2026