The Seasonally Adjusted CPI Was up 0.40% in Sept & 3.7% over the last 12 months

See Consumer Price Index for All Urban Consumers: All Items in U.S. City Average from FRED (Federal Reserve Economic Data) compiled by the Research Division at the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis for data on the seasonally adjusted CPI.

That site shows a graph but if you click on the Download button you will get the actual numbers in Microsoft Excel.

The Consumer Price Index for All Urban Consumers: All Items in U.S. City Average (CPIAUCSL) was 307.481 in Sept. and 306.269 in Aug. Since 307.481/306.269 = 1.0040, that means it was up 0.40% in Sept. If we had that every month for 12 months it would be up 5.45%.

It was 296.539 in Sept. 2022. Since 307.481/296.539 = 1.037, that means it was up 3.7% over the last 12 months.

The non-seasonally adjusted CPI was 307.789 in Sept. and 296.808 in Sept. 2022. That was up 3.7% since 307.789/296.808 = 1.037. So pretty close to the seasonally adjusted CPI. This is still above the Fed's target of 2.0% (although they prefer to use the Personal Consumption Expenditures Price Index).

For more information, see Don’t expect prices to go down soon: It will take a while to ‘wring extra inflation out of the economy,’ says economist Mike Winters of CNBC. Excerpts: 

"Inflation isn’t getting worse — but it’s still too high. 

That’s the takeaway from the latest consumer price index report released Thursday, which reveals that the cost of U.S. goods and services stayed flat in September with a year-over-year rate of 3.7%, the same as August.

However, that’s still well above the Federal Reserve’s target of 2%. Despite inflation dropping from a June 2022 peak of 9.1%, the central bank doesn’t expect inflation to reach its target until at least 2026.

Month over month, overall inflation increased 0.4% in September. In August, the month-over-month rate was 0.6%.

Core inflation — the measure of prices excluding volatile food and gas prices — is considered by the Fed to be the best measure of where inflation is headed.

In September, core inflation posted a second consecutive monthly gain of 0.3%, which is roughly half the rate of inflation during summer 2022. That’s still a bit too high, based on the Fed’s target."

Other related links:

Consumer Price Index Data from 1913 to 2023

Personal Consumption Expenditures Price Index 

The Bureau of Labor Statistics makes seasonal adjustments. See Consumer Price Index Summary.