In January 2025, prices had increased by three percent compared to January 2024 according to the 12-month percentage change in the consumer price index — the monthly inflation rate for goods and services in the United States. The data represents U.S. city averages. In economics, the inflation rate is a measure of the change in price level over time. The rate of decrease in the purchasing power of money is approximately equal. A projection of the annual U.S. inflation rate can be accessed here and the actual annual inflation rate since 1990 can be accessed here. InflationOne of the most important economic indicators is the development of the Consumer Price Index in a country. The change in this price level of goods and services is defined as the rate of inflation. The inflationary situation in the United States had been relatively severe in 2022 due to global events relating to COVID-19, supply chain restrains, and the Russian invasion of Ukraine. More information on U.S. inflation may be found on our dedicated topic page. The annual inflation rate in the United States has increased from 3.2 percent in 2011 to 8.3 percent in 2022. This means that the purchasing power of the U.S. dollar has weakened in recent years. The purchasing power is the extent to which a person has available funds to make purchases. According to the data published by the International Monetary Fund, the U.S. Consumer Price Index (CPI) was about 258.84 in 2020 and is forecasted to grow up to 325.6 by 2027, compared to the base period from 1982 to 1984. The monthly percentage change in the Consumer Price Index (CPI) for urban consumers in the United States was 0.1 percent in March 2023 compared to the previous month. In 2022, countries all around the world are experienced high levels of inflation. Although Brazil already had an inflation rate of 8.3 percent in 2021, compared to the previous year, while the inflation rate in China stood at 0.85 percent.

Inflation is generally defined as the continued increase in the average prices of goods and services in a given region. Following the extremely high global inflation experienced in the 1980s and 1990s, global inflation has been relatively stable since the turn of the millennium, usually hovering between three and five percent per year. There was a sharp increase in 2008 due to the global financial crisis now known as the Great Recession, but inflation was fairly stable throughout the 2010s, before the current inflation crisis began in 2021. Recent years Despite the economic impact of the coronavirus pandemic, the global inflation rate fell to 3.26 percent in the pandemic's first year, before rising to 4.66 percent in 2021. This increase came as the impact of supply chain delays began to take more of an effect on consumer prices, before the Russia-Ukraine war exacerbated this further. A series of compounding issues such as rising energy and food prices, fiscal instability in the wake of the pandemic, and consumer insecurity have created a new global recession, and global inflation in 2024 is estimated to have reached 5.76 percent. This is the highest annual increase in inflation since 1996. Venezuela Venezuela is the country with the highest individual inflation rate in the world, forecast at around 200 percent in 2022. While this is figure is over 100 times larger than the global average in most years, it actually marks a decrease in Venezuela's inflation rate, which had peaked at over 65,000 percent in 2018. Between 2016 and 2021, Venezuela experienced hyperinflation due to the government's excessive spending and printing of money in an attempt to curve its already-high inflation rate, and the wave of migrants that left the country resulted in one of the largest refugee crises in recent years. In addition to its economic problems, political instability and foreign sanctions pose further long-term problems for Venezuela. While hyperinflation may be coming to an end, it remains to be seen how much of an impact this will have on the economy, how living standards will change, and how many refugees may return in the coming years.

As of April 2025, the inflation rate in the European Union was 2.4 percent, with prices rising fastest in Romania, which had an inflation rate of 4.9 percent. By contrast, both France and Cyprus saw low inflation rates during the same period, with France having the lowest inflation rate in the EU during this month. The rate of inflation in the EU in the October 2022 was higher than at any other time, with the peak prior to 2021 recorded in July 2008 when prices were growing by 4.4 percent year-on-year. Before the recent rises in inflation, price rises in the EU had been kept at relatively low levels, with the inflation rate remaining below three percent between January 2012 and August 2021. Rapid recovery and energy costs driving inflation The reopening of the European economy in 2021 following the sudden shock of COVID-19 in 2020 is behind many of the factors that have caused prices to rise so quickly in 2022. Global supply chains have not yet recovered from production issues, travel restrictions, and workforce problems brought about by the pandemic. Rising energy costs have only served to exacerbate supply problems, particularly with regard to the transport sector, which had the highest inflation rate of any sector in the EU in December 2021. High inflation rates mirrored in the U.S. The high inflation rates seen in Europe have been reflected in other parts of the world. In the United States, for example, the consumer price index reached a 40-year-high of seven percent in December 2021, influenced by many of the same factors driving European inflation. Nevertheless, it is hoped that once these supply chain issues ease, inflation levels will start to fall throughout the course of 2022.

According to a survey conducted between July 9 and July 11, 2022, 45 percent of Americans thought that Joe Biden was highly responsible for the current trend in the inflation rate. This is compared to 26 percent of Americans who said President Biden did not have a lot of responsibility for the current inflation rate.

Inflation in the U.S. Global events in 2022 had a significant impact on the United States. Inflation rose from 1.4 percent in January 2021 to 9.1 percent in June 2022. Significantly higher prices of basic goods led to increased concern over the state of the economy, and the ability to cover increasing monthly costs with the same income. Low interest rates, COVID-19-related supply constraints, corporate profiteering, and strong consumer spending had already put pressure on prices before Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. Despite rising wages on paper, the rapid growth of consumer prices resulted in an overall decline in real hourly earnings in the first half of 2022.

How much control does Joe Biden have over inflation? The bulk of economic performance and the inflation rate is determined by factors outside the President’s direct control, but U.S. presidents are often held accountable for it. Some of those factors are market forces, private business, productivity growth, the state of the global economy, and policies of the Federal Reserve. Although high-spending decisions such as the 2021 COVID-19 relief bill may have contributed to rising inflation rates, the bill has been seen by economists as a necessary intervention for preventing a recession at the time, as well as being of significant importance to low-income workers impacted by the pandemic.

The most important tool for curbing inflation and controlling the U.S. economy is the Federal Reserve. The Reserve has the ability to set, raise, and lower interest rates and determine the wider monetary policy for the United States – something out of the president’s control. In June 2022, the Reserve announced it would raise interest rates 0.75 percent for the second time that year – hoisting the rate to a target range of 2.25 to 2.5 percent – in an attempt to slow consumer demand and balance demand with supply. However, it can often take time before the impacts of interventions by the Federal Reserve are seen in the public’s day-to-day lives. Most economists expect this wave of inflation to pass in a year to 18 months.

The German inflation rate has returned to normal levels of around 2.2 percent, based on preliminary figures for 2024. Compared to skyrocketing rates in 2022 and 2023, this can be seen as an improvement of the national economic situation. Various factors influenced the recent development of inflation in Germany. These are the same that pushed inflation levels around the rest of the world, particularly since the beginning of the Russia-Ukraine war in 2022. The most recent recorded annual inflation rate in Germany is within the normal range defined by central banks internationally, which is generally between 1.5 and four percent a year. The 2.2 percent for 2024 are not only noticeably lower than the preceding two years, but also less than in 2021, one of the COVID-19 pandemic lockdown years in Germany. 2022 and 2023 followed on the heels of the challenges posed by the pandemic which were already straining the national economy: supply chain interruptions and delays, transport problems, labor shortages across sectors and industries. These issues continue to partially impact the economy today.

This national survey focuses on attitudes toward economic conditions, causes of inflation, and wage-price controls.

Questions include personal financial status, equity of various price increases, overall performance and effectiveness of Pay Board and Price Commission, prices of food and other goods, wage increases, wage- price freeze. There are also some current events questions that focus on the upcoming presidential election and include rating of Richard Nixon, Spiro Agnew, and George McGovern.

The inflation rate for the Republic of Ireland in May 2025 was *** percent, down from *** percent in the previous month. During the provided time period, inflation reached a peak of *** percent in October 2022, and was at its lowest in October 2020, when prices were falling by *** percent. In the most recent month, the sector which had the fastest rate of price rises was food, at **** percent, while prices were falling by *** percent for transportation. Inflation subsides but remains a key issue Like in many other economies, the global inflation crisis, led to increased inflation in Ireland from 2021 to 2023, reaching a peak of *** percent in late 2022. As of October 2024, approximately ** percent of people in Ireland, still saw inflation as one of the top two most important issues facing the country, down from ** percent in July 2022. Furthermore, inflation was second only to housing as a top issue in the country, ahead of health, immigration, and climate change. Another survey highlights the fact that despite inflation subsiding, people are still struggling with the cost of living. When asked how well they are coping financially, just ****** percent of respondents advised they were living comfortably, with ** percent just getting by, and almost a quarter finding it quite, or very difficult. Key economic indicators of Ireland Ireland's overall gross domestic product (GDP) in 2024 was estimated to be over ***** billion U.S. dollars, up from ***** billion dollars in 2023. Due to the presence of several multinational companies in the country, however, Ireland's GDP figure can be misleading. In 2022, for example, while overall GDP was ***** billion Euros, gross national income (GNI) was just ***** billion Euros, with modified GNI even lower at ***** billion Euros. Looking at Ireland's labor market, there were around **** million people employed in the country in 2024, while the unemployment rate has, as of early 2025, fluctuated between **** and *** percent since April 2022.

This is not going to be an article or Op-Ed about Michael Jordan. Since 2009 we've been in the longest bull-market in history, that's 11 years and counting. However a few metrics like the stock market P/E, the call to put ratio and of course the Shiller P/E suggest a great crash is coming in-between the levels of 1929 and the dot.com bubble. Mean reversion historically is inevitable and the Fed's printing money experiment could end in disaster for the stock market in late 2021 or 2022. You can read Jeremy Grantham's Last Dance article here. You are likely well aware of Michael Burry's predicament as well. It's easier for you just to skim through two related videos on this topic of a stock market crash. Michael Burry's Warning see this YouTube. Jeremy Grantham's Warning See this YouTube. Typically when there is a major event in the world, there is a crash and then a bear market and a recovery that takes many many months. In March, 2020 that's not what we saw since the Fed did some astonishing things that means a liquidity sloth and the risk of a major inflation event. The pandemic represented the quickest decline of at least 30% in the history of the benchmark S&P 500, but the recovery was not correlated to anything but Fed intervention. Since the pandemic clearly isn't disappearing and many sectors such as travel, business travel, tourism and supply chain disruptions appear significantly disrupted - the so-called economic recovery isn't so great. And there's this little problem at the heart of global capitalism today, the stock market just keeps going up. Crashes and corrections typically occur frequently in a normal market. But the Fed liquidity and irresponsible printing of money is creating a scenario where normal behavior isn't occurring on the markets. According to data provided by market analytics firm Yardeni Research, the benchmark index has undergone 38 declines of at least 10% since the beginning of 1950. Since March, 2020 we've barely seen a down month. September, 2020 was flat-ish. The S&P 500 has more than doubled since those lows. Look at the angle of the curve: The S&P 500 was 735 at the low in 2009, so in this bull market alone it has gone up 6x in valuation. That's not a normal cycle and it could mean we are due for an epic correction. I have to agree with the analysts who claim that the long, long bull market since 2009 has finally matured into a fully-fledged epic bubble. There is a complacency, buy-the dip frenzy and general meme environment to what BigTech can do in such an environment. The weight of Apple, Amazon, Alphabet, Microsoft, Facebook, Nvidia and Tesla together in the S&P and Nasdaq is approach a ridiculous weighting. When these stocks are seen both as growth, value and companies with unbeatable moats the entire dynamics of the stock market begin to break down. Check out FANG during the pandemic. BigTech is Seen as Bullet-Proof me valuations and a hysterical speculative behavior leads to even higher highs, even as 2020 offered many younger people an on-ramp into investing for the first time. Some analysts at JP Morgan are even saying that until retail investors stop charging into stocks, markets probably don’t have too much to worry about. Hedge funds with payment for order flows can predict exactly how these retail investors are behaving and monetize them. PFOF might even have to be banned by the SEC. The risk-on market theoretically just keeps going up until the Fed raises interest rates, which could be in 2023! For some context, we're more than 1.4 years removed from the bear-market bottom of the coronavirus crash and haven't had even a 5% correction in nine months. This is the most over-priced the market has likely ever been. At the night of the dot-com bubble the S&P 500 was only 1,400. Today it is 4,500, not so many years after. Clearly something is not quite right if you look at history and the P/E ratios. A market pumped with liquidity produces higher earnings with historically low interest rates, it's an environment where dangerous things can occur. In late 1997, as the S&P 500 passed its previous 1929 peak of 21x earnings, that seemed like a lot, but nothing compared to today. For some context, the S&P 500 Shiller P/E closed last week at 38.58, which is nearly a two-decade high. It's also well over double the average Shiller P/E of 16.84, dating back 151 years. So the stock market is likely around 2x over-valued. Try to think rationally about what this means for valuations today and your favorite stock prices, what should they be in historical terms? The S&P 500 is up 31% in the past year. It will likely hit 5,000 before a correction given the amount of added liquidity to the system and the QE the Fed is using that's like a huge abuse of MMT, or Modern Monetary Theory. This has also lent to bubbles in the housing market, crypto and even commodities like Gold with long-term global GDP meeting many headwinds in the years ahead due to a demographic shift of an ageing population and significant technological automation. So if you think that stocks or equities or ETFs are the best place to put your money in 2022, you might want to think again. The crash of the OTC and small-cap market since February 2021 has been quite an indication of what a correction looks like. According to the Motley Fool what happens after major downturns in the market historically speaking? In each of the previous four instances that the S&P 500's Shiller P/E shot above and sustained 30, the index lost anywhere from 20% to 89% of its value. So what's what we too are due for, reversion to the mean will be realistically brutal after the Fed's hyper-extreme intervention has run its course. Of course what the Fed stimulus has really done is simply allowed the 1% to get a whole lot richer to the point of wealth inequality spiraling out of control in the decades ahead leading us likely to a dystopia in an unfair and unequal version of BigTech capitalism. This has also led to a trend of short squeeze to these tech stocks, as shown in recent years' data. Of course the Fed has to say that's its done all of these things for the people, employment numbers and the labor market. Women in the workplace have been set behind likely 15 years in social progress due to the pandemic and the Fed's response. While the 89% lost during the Great Depression would be virtually impossible today thanks to ongoing intervention from the Federal Reserve and Capitol Hill, a correction of 20% to 50% would be pretty fair and simply return the curve back to a normal trajectory as interest rates going back up eventually in the 2023 to 2025 period. It's very unlikely the market has taken Fed tapering into account (priced-in), since the euphoria of a can't miss market just keeps pushing the markets higher. But all good things must come to an end. Earlier this month, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics released inflation data from July. This report showed that the Consumer Price Index for All Urban Consumers rose 5.2% over the past 12 months. While the Fed and economists promise us this inflation is temporary, others are not so certain. As you print so much money, the money you have is worth less and certain goods cost more. Wage gains in some industries cannot be taken back, they are permanent - in the service sector like restaurants, hospitality and travel that have been among the hardest hit. The pandemic has led to a paradigm shift in the future of work, and that too is not temporary. The Great Resignation means white collar jobs with be more WFM than ever before, with a new software revolution, different transport and energy behaviors and so forth. Climate change alone could slow down global GDP in the 21st century. How can inflation be temporary when so many trends don't appear to be temporary? Sure the price of lumber or used-cars could be temporary, but a global chip shortage is exasperating the automobile sector. The stock market isn't even behaving like it cares about anything other than the Fed, and its $billions of dollars of buying bonds each month. Some central banks will start to taper about December, 2021 (like the European). However Delta could further mutate into a variant that makes the first generation of vaccines less effective. Such a macro event could be enough to trigger the correction we've been speaking about. So stay safe, and keep your money safe. The Last Dance of the 2009 bull market could feel especially more painful because we've been spoiled for so long in the markets. We can barely remember what March, 2020 felt like. Some people sold their life savings simply due to scare tactics by the likes of Bill Ackman. His scare tactics on CNBC won him likely hundreds of millions as the stock market tanked. Hedge funds further gamed the Reddit and Gamestop movement, orchestrating them and leading the new retail investors into meme speculation and a whole bunch of other unsavory things like options trading at such scale we've never seen before. It's not just inflation and higher interest rates, it's how absurdly high valuations have become. Still correlation does not imply causation. Just because inflation has picked up, it doesn't guarantee that stocks will head lower. Nevertheless, weaker buying power associated with higher inflation can't be overlooked as a potential negative for the U.S. economy and equities. The current S&P500 10-year P/E Ratio is 38.7. This is 97% above the modern-era market average of 19.6, putting the current P/E 2.5 standard deviations above the modern-era average. This is just math, folks. History is saying the stock market is 2x its true value. So why and who would be full on the market or an asset class like crypto that is mostly speculative in nature to begin with? Study the following on a historical basis, and due your own due diligence as to the health of the markets: Debt-to-GDP ratio Call to put ratio

This special-topic poll is part of a continuing series of monthly surveys that solicit public opinion on the presidency and on a range of other social and political issues. Respondents were questioned about political issues involved in the upcoming midterm congressional elections. Issues included the Middle East, the economy, inflation, Social Security, unemployment, and attitudes toward and perceptions of the two major political parties and Congress. Demographic information about the respondents includes age, sex, race, income, educational background, marital status, type of residence, and employment status.

In 2024, Japan had an average inflation rate estimated at 2.74 percent, marking the highest rate of inflation in Japan in almost a decade. However, this figure was still very low compared to most other major economies, such as Japan's fellow G7 members, four of which had inflation rates around six or seven percent in 2023 due to the global inflation crisis. Why is Japan's inflation rate lower? There are a number of contributing factors to Japan's relatively low inflation rate, even during economic crises. Japan eased its Covid restrictions more slowly than most other major economies, this prevented post-pandemic consumer spending that may have driven inflation through supply chain issues caused by higher demand. As the majority of Japan's food and energy comes from overseas, and has done so for decades, the government has mechanisms in place to prevent energy and wheat prices from rising too quickly. Because of this, Japan was able to shield its private sector from many of the negative knock on effects from Russia's invasion of Ukraine, which had a significant impact on both sectors globally. Persistent deflation and national debt An additional factor that has eased the impact of inflation on Japan's economy is the fact that it experienced deflation before the pandemic. Deflation has been a persistent problem in Japan since the asset price bubble burst in 1992, and has been symptomatic of Japan's staggering national debt thereafter. For almost 30 years, a combination of quantitative easing, low interest rates (below 0.5 percent since 1995, and at -0.1% since 2016), and a lack of spending due to low wages and an aging population have combined to give Japan the highest national debt in the world in absolute terms, and second-highest debt in relation to its GDP, after Venezuela. Despite this soaring debt, Japan remains the fourth-largest economy in the world, behind the U.S., China, and Germany.

Inflation was the most worrying topic worldwide as of May 2025, with ********* of the respondents choosing that option. Crime and violence, as well as poverty and social inequality, followed behind. Moreover, following Russia's invasion of Ukraine and the war in Gaza, *** percent of the respondents were worried about military conflict between nations. Only *** percent were worried about the COVID-19 pandemic, which dominated the world after its outbreak in 2020. Global inflation and rising prices Inflation rates have spiked substantially since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020. From 2020 to 2021, the worldwide inflation rate increased from 3.5 percent to 4.7 percent, and from 2021 to 2022, the rate increased sharply from 4.7 percent to 8.7 percent. While rates are predicted to fall come 2025, many are continuing to struggle with price increases on basic necessities. Poverty and global development Poverty and social inequality were the third most worrying issues to respondents. While poverty and inequality are still prominent, global poverty rates have been on a steady decline over the years. In 1994, 64 percent of people in low-income countries and around one percent of people in high-income countries lived on less than 2.15 U.S. dollars per day. By 2018, this had fallen to almost 44 percent of people in low-income countries and 0.6 percent in high-income countries. Moreover, fewer people globally are dying of preventable diseases, and people are living longer lives. Despite these aspects, issues such as wealth inequality have global prominence.

In 2021, the inflation rate in Ghana amounted to about 9.98 percent compared to the previous year. Ghana’s inflation peaked at almost 17.5 percent in 2016 and is predicted to decrease to 8 percent by 2030. Steady is best for inflationAccording to economists, a steady inflation rate between two and three percent is desirable to achieve a stable economy in a country. Inflation is the increase in the price level of consumer goods and services over a certain time period. A high inflation rate is often caused by excessive money supply and can turn into hyperinflation, i.e. if inflation occurs too quickly and rapidly, it can devalue currency and cause a recession and even economic collapse. This scenario is currently taking place in Venezuela , for example. The opposite of inflation, the decrease in the price level of goods and services below zero percent, is called deflation. While hyperinflation devalues money, deflation usually increases its value. Both events can damage an economy severely. Is Ghana’s economy at risk?Ghana’s economy is considered quite stable and fast-growing, and is rich in oil, diamonds, and gold. After struggling in the years around 2015 due to increased government spending and plummeting oil prices, it is now on an upswing again. This is also reflected in the decreasing inflation rate, and other key indicators like unemployment and rapid GDP growth support this theory. However, Ghana’s government debt is still struggling with the consequences of the 2015 crisis and forecast to keep skyrocketing during the next few years.

In 2018, the average inflation rate in Egypt amounted to about 20.85 percent, a slight decrease compared to the previous year, when it peaked at 23.53 percent.

Political unrest

Egypt has been shaken by political unrest and turmoil for years now, and these events affect the economy as well. On January 25, 2011, Egyptians started protesting police brutality under then-president Hosni Mubarak, demanding an end to his reign. The protests were met with violence by armed forces, resulting in more unrest and looting. In the end, hundreds of Egyptians had lost their lives and over 6,000 were injured. After Mubarak’s subsequent resignation and the Muslim Brotherhood taking power in the country, Mohamed Morsi was elected President in 2012. He also was overthrown a year later after protests and was imprisoned. The current President, Abdel Fattah es-Sisi, was involved in overthrowing Morsi and took office in June 2014. Sisi introduced a number of economic reforms, but they did not succeed in stabilizing Egypt’s economy.

Economic unrest

2017 saw the Egyptian inflation rate skyrocket from 10.2 percent in 2016 to more than double that at 23.5 percent. Ever since, inflation has recovered only slowly, although projections today see it levelling off below ten percent in the future. Around the same year, Egypt’s GDP dropped to below 240 billion U.S. dollars, a historical low. Unemployment, another key indicator, has steadily been between 12 to 13 percent - one reason for this is Egypt’s reliance on agriculture, which does not factor into the unemployment rate. National debt has also increased dramatically over the last few years. All in all, the times of economic unrest are not yet over.

Zimbabwe had the highest inflation in Africa as of 2023. The rate reached roughly 172 percent when compared to the previous year, according to the source's estimates. This was followed by Sudan, with a rate increase of over 71 percent. Inflationary pressures in the country have been driven by a long-running economic crisis and political instability. By the end of 2021, the already fragile Sudanese economy suffered again when military forces took control of the government. With a

Inflation Rate in Philippines decreased to 1.30 percent in May from 1.40 percent in April of 2025. This dataset provides the latest reported value for - Philippines Inflation Rate - plus previous releases, historical high and low, short-term forecast and long-term prediction, economic calendar, survey consensus and news.

In May 2025, the Consumer Price Index including owner occupiers' housing costs (CPIH) inflation rate of the United Kingdom was **** percent, down from *** percent in the previous month. The inflation rate fell noticeably after the COVID-19 pandemic, but rose sharply between Spring 2021 and Autumn 2022. After peaking at *** percent in October 2022, CPIH inflation declined throughout 2023 and into 2024, falling to *** percent by September of that year, before increasing again recently. Cost of living problems persist into 2025 Although it is likely that the worst of the recent inflation surge may have passed, the issues caused by it look set to linger into 2025 and beyond. While the share of households experiencing living cost rises has fallen from ** percent in August 2022, to ** percent in July 2024, this share rose towards the end of the year, with more than half of households reporting rising costs in December. Even with lower inflation, overall consumer prices have already increased by around ** percent in the last three years, rising to almost ** percent for food prices, which lower income households typically spend more of their income on. The significant increase in people relying on food banks across the UK, is evidence of the magnitude of this problem, with approximately **** million people using food banks in 2023/**. Other measure of inflation While the CPIH inflation rate displayed here is the preferred index of the UK's Office of National Statistics, the Consumer Price Index (CPI) is often more prominently featured in the media in general. An older index, the Retail Price Index (RPI) is also still used by the government to calculate certain taxes, and rail fare rises. Other metrics include the core inflation rate, which measures prices increases without the volatility of food and energy costs, while price increases in goods and services can also be tracked separately. The inflation rate of individual sectors can also be measured, and as of December 2024, prices were rising fastest in the communications sector, at *** percent, with costs falling in the transport and furniture sectors.

The economy was seen by 49 percent of people in the UK as one of the top three issues facing the country in June 2025. The ongoing cost of living crisis afflicting the UK, driven by high inflation, is still one of the main concerns of Britons. Immigration has generally been the second most important issue since the middle of 2024, just ahead of health, which was seen as the third-biggest issue in the most recent month. Labour's popularity continues to sink in 2025 Despite winning the 2024 general election with a strong majority, the new Labour government has had its share of struggles since coming to power. Shortly after taking office, the approval rating for Labour stood at -2 percent, but this fell throughout the second half of 2024, and by January 2025 had sunk to a new low of -47 percent. Although this was still higher than the previous government's last approval rating of -56 percent, it is nevertheless a severe review from the electorate. Among several decisions from the government, arguably the least popular was the government withdrawing winter fuel payments. This state benefit, previously paid to all pensioners, is now only paid to those on low incomes, with millions of pensioners not receiving this payment in winter 2024. Sunak's pledges fail to prevent defeat in 2024 With an election on the horizon, and the Labour Party consistently ahead in the polls, addressing voter concerns directly was one of the best chances the Conservatives had of staying in power in 2023. At the start of that year, Rishi Sunak attempted to do this by setting out his five pledges for the next twelve months; halve inflation, grow the economy, reduce national debt, cut NHS waiting times, and stop small boats. A year later, Sunak had at best only partial success in these aims. Although the inflation rate fell, economic growth was weak and even declined in the last two quarters of 2023, although it did return to growth in early 2024. National debt was only expected to fall in the mid to late 2020s, while the trend of increasing NHS waiting times did not reverse. Small boat crossings were down from 2022, but still higher than in 2021 or 2020. .

In December 2024, 11 percent of survey respondents said that the most important problem facing the United States was the high cost of living and inflation. Another 20percent said that the government and poor leadership was the most serious concern for the nation.

In May 2025, the balance value of the ifo Business Climate Index for the German trade sector was -20.3 points, indicating that more wholesale and retail companies were assessing their current situation as negative rather than positive. Figures fluctuated during the timeline displayed, which covers the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic and current economic events, such as inflation levels and energy supply difficulties. What is the ifo Business Climate? The ifo Business Climate is an indicator for economic activity in Germany. It is based on approximately 9,000 monthly responses from businesses in manufacturing, the service sector, trade, and construction. Companies are asked to give their assessments of the current business situation and their expectations for the next six months. They can describe their situation as “good,” “satisfactory,” or “poor” and their business expectations for the next six months as “more favorable,” “unchanged,” or “less favorable.” The balance value of the current business situation is the difference in the percentage shares of the responses “good” and “poor”; the balance value of expectations is the difference in the percentage shares of the responses “more favorable” and “less favorable.” The business climate is a transformed mean of the balances of the business situation and the expectations. To calculate the index values, the transformed balances are all normalized to the average for the year 2015.