The Consumer Price Index is used to calculate inflation, or the change in price of a basket of goods and services, as it impacts consumers; whereas, the Producer Price Index measures changes in selling prices, thereby expressing price changes from the perspective of the seller who produces a particular commodity.
A slide presentation updated with January 2017 data shows the Midwest inflation rate increased from December to January. While the urban metropolitan areas noticed a 0.64% increase, the non-metropolitan urban areas saw a slightly smaller increase of 0.54%.
The Producer Price Index data shows that prices in the United States have increased from January 2016 to January 2017 for aircraft (1.1 percent), crude petroleum (80.9 percent), and natural gas (93.2 percent). During that same time period, the index decreased slaughter livestock (-9.4 percent), sorghum (-8.6 percent) and wheat (-11.3 percent).