Federal Reserve minutes: Some officials highlighted worsening inflation last month

By CHRISTOPHER RUGABER
AP Economics Writer

WASHINGTON (AP) — Some Federal Reserve policymakers argued at their most recent meeting in March that inflation was likely worsening, even before the government reported Wednesday that price increases re-accelerated last month. According to the minutes of the Fed’s meeting, all 19 officials generally agreed that high inflation readings in January and February “had not increased their confidence” that inflation was falling steadily to their 2% target. Many economists had suggested that the outsize price increases in the first two months of the year probably reflected one-time increases. But some Fed officials at the March meeting said the higher prices were “relatively broad-based and therefore should not be discounted as merely statistical aberrations.”