The consumer price inflation in Japan in October stood at 3.8%. Consumer prices increased for the seventh consecutive month due to rising fuel and food prices, also as a result of import prices rising due to the yen's continued to decline to 32-year lows. Finally, consumer prices increased by 0.59% over the previous month in October, adding to the 0.38% rise shown in September. The reading in October was the highest since August 2018. The primary consumer price index (CPI) includes oil products but excludes fresh food. Japan also produces a "core-core" price index, which eliminates energy as well. When fresh food products were included, inflation was 3.7%. Costs of food increased overall by 6.2%. Fish and shellfish (16%) and vegetables (6.7%) saw the biggest price rises, accounting for 8.1% of the overall increase in the cost of fresh food.
Currently, the headline core consumer price index (CPI) has risen for 14 straight months, which puts more pressure on the Bank of Japan to modify its long-standing monetary easing policy. The increase in the index, which includes oil goods but excludes volatile fresh food prices, demonstrated that inflation remained above the Bank of Japan's (BOJ) target of 2% for a seventh straight month. According to the October statistics, rising raw material prices and the weakening yen were to blame for an increase in energy costs of 15.2%, while food prices, excluding perishables, increased at their sharpest rate since March 1981, by 5.9%.
The unemployment rate in Japan hit 2.6% in October 2022, the same as in the previous month only a little higher than the 2.5% market average, although as anticipated, the job-to-application ratio increased slightly to 1.35. Employment in the hospitality industries is projected to increase as domestic and international tourism increases, but employment in manufacturing is likely to decline as a result of the poor manufacturing outlook reflected by export data.
In October comparison to a month ago, the number of unemployed dropped 2.7% to 1.7 million on a seasonally adjusted basis, while the number of employed people decreased by 0.1% to 67.36 million. The inflation rate in Japan has been steadfastly low, occasionally going negative, or deflation. Due to this, businesses have postponed investments and consumers have put off big purchases, which has resulted in slow GDP growth. This would result in substantial inflation in the majority of economies. However, firms may be keeping workers because of a labor shortage given the declining population and resulting declining workforce.
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