The Consumer Price Index for March 2011 increased 0.5% from last month. For the year, the Consumer Price Index for all Urban Consumers (CPI-U) has risen 2.7%, the highest since December 2009. The February CPI monthly increase was also 0.5%.
Gas and food was 75% of the CPI increase for the month. Food at home increased, 1.1% from February to March, Gas alone rose 5.6% and Fuel Oil increased 6.2% from last month. For the year, Gas is up 27.5%, fuel oil up 34%, that's over a third, and food at home has increased 3.6%. One must wonder what kind of substitution is going on with food though for it to only be 3.6% versus what real people experience at the grocery. Heating your house with gas, on the other hand, dropped another -1.4% and is down -5.5% for the year. Below is the monthly percentage change in CPI-U.