Biden: White House doing ‘everything we can’ to combat inflation
President Biden said Monday that Congress needs to pass his sweeping economic agenda in order to tamp down rising inflation amid concerns that another burst of government spending will act as an accelerant to already rapidly rising consumer prices.
“As our economy has come roaring back, we’ve seen some price increases,” the president said, speaking from the White House. “Some folks have raised worries that could be a sign of persistent inflation. But that’s not our view.”
Biden said that his administration was doing “everything we can” to address the higher-than-expected inflation, but he pushed back against fears of persistent inflation and maintained his stance the recent surge in consumer prices is temporary.
“Look, we brought this economy back from the brink. There are going to be ups and downs,” he said. “Reality is you can’t flip the global economic light back on and not expect this to happen. As demand returns, there’s going to be global supply chain challenges.”
The government reported last week that prices for goods and services jumped by the most in 13 years, fueling concerns that a rapidly rebounding economy could lead to runaway growth. The Labor Department said in its monthly report that consumer prices rose 0.9% from May and 5.4% over the past year.
Excluding volatile oil and gas prices, so-called core inflation jumped 4.5% over the past year, the largest increase since November 1991.
Republicans have latched onto the inflation issues, blaming the $1.9 trillion stimulus bill that Democrats passed without any GOP votes in March for the price spike and attacking Biden for moving forward with another $4 trillion in new spending.
