‘Can You Give Me A Timeline?’: Biden Adviser Dodges Question About When Inflation Will Go Down

‘Can You Give Me A Timeline?’: Biden Adviser Dodges Question About When Inflation Will Go Down

Harold Hutchison on September 16, 2022

A top economic adviser to President Joe Biden evaded questions from Fox News host Martha MacCallum about when inflation would go down Friday.

“Can you give me a timeline? Because, obviously, let’s put up where inflation has gone since the beginning of the Biden administration, this is a huge problem, and you have Larry Summers saying, look, when you eat too much, you are going to be uncomfortable for a really long time,” MacCallum asked Gene Sperling, a senior advisor to the president who coordinates the American Rescue Plan. “And he has said, repeatedly, that way too much stimulus went into this market. That is a very difficult chart that we are looking at here. So, give us a sense, if this inflation reduction act is going to eventually work … when, what is the timeline, you know, as you look at this as an economist?”

Sperling failed to answer the question, claimed that the Inflation Reduction Act, signed into law by President Biden in August, was a series of policies, citing everything from lower energy prices, price controls on insulin and prescription drugs.

“I do feel more optimistic that there are some positive signs. Inventories tend to be higher, and we believe this will bring more discounting and lower prices,” Sperling said. “You had a huge influx of people into the labor market. One of the challenges is that we are seeing a cooling in housing prices and the housing market. But, it does happen to be that it can take a little bit of time to show up. That can take a little longer to show up, officially, in the inflation numbers. So, I do think we are moving in the right direction.”

“When do you expect people to feel some genuine relief from that chart that we just showed? Five months, six months, two years, three years?” MacCallum asked.

“People have felt relief at the gas pump already, it’s down over $1.30 a gallon,” Sperling said. “You are under $3.70 an average. The typical gas station is now charging about $3.39. So I think people are seeing some relief.”

The Consumer Price Index rose by 8.3% year-to-year in August after it climbed by 8.5% in July, 9.1% in June and 8.6% in May.