Photograph by Nathaniel St. Clair

The Guardian has had a series of pieces in the last year looking at ways that stores and landlords rip off customers and tenants. In the case of stores, one piece found evidence that convenience stores charge prices at the checkout counter that are higher than the price listed on the shelf. A prior piece reported that Dollar stores also frequently charge people more than the shelf price.

Another one reported on fees and fines that landlords often impose on top of rent. In addition to these practices being unethical, and likely illegal, they also raise the question of whether they may lead to an understatement of inflation in the Consumer Price Index (CPI) and other measures of inflation.

The problem from the standpoint of the CPI is that the Bureau of Labor Statistics’ (BLS) price checkers would be recording the........

© CounterPunch