Prices in the Dallas-Fort Worth-Arlington area, as measured by the Consumer Price Index for All Urban Consumers (CPI-U), advanced 0.8 percent for the two months ending in May 2023, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported today. Assistant Commissioner for Regional Operations Michael Hirniak noted that the all items less food and energy index rose by 0.8 percent in April and May, largely due to an increase in the indexes for owners’ equivalent rent of residences and used cars and trucks. The food index was up 1.4 percent, while the energy index fell 0.3 percent over the past two months.  (Data in this report are not seasonally adjusted. Accordingly, bi-monthly changes may reflect seasonal influences.)

Over the last 12 months, the CPI-U advanced 4.7 percent. The index for all items less food and energy increased 7.0 percent, and food prices rose 8.2 percent over the year. Energy prices fell 17.5 percent, largely due to declining prices for gasoline. (See chart 1 and table 1.)

  

View Chart Data

Chart 1. Over-the-year percent change in CPI-U, Dallas-Fort Worth-Arlington, TX, May 2020–May 2023

Month	All items	All items less food and energy
May 2020	-0.5	1.3
Jul 2020	0.4	1.4
Sep 2020	0.4	1.0
Nov 2020	0.3	0.9
Jan 2021	1.5	1.6
Mar 2021	3.4	2.5
May 2021	6.3	4.8
Jul 2021	5.6	4.6
Sep 2021	5.9	4.2
Nov 2021	7.5	5.5
Jan 2022	7.8	6.3
Mar 2022	9.0	6.5
May 2022	9.1	6.0
Jul 2022	9.4	5.7
Sep 2022	9.2	7.2
Nov 2022	8.4	7.6
Jan 2023	7.5	7.2
Mar 2023	5.8	7.4
May 2023	4.7	7.0

Food prices rose 1.4 percent for the two months ending in May. Prices for food away from home advanced by 1.6 percent, while prices paid for food at home rose 1.3 percent over the same period. The main contributors to the increase in the food at home index were the other food at home (+2.3 percent), cereals and bakery products (+2.8 percent), and meats, poultry, fish, and eggs (+1.2 percent) categories. Declining prices for dairy and related products (-1.0 percent) slightly offset the rise.

Over the year, food prices rose 8.2 percent. Prices for food away from home were up 11.5 percent, while prices for food at home advanced 5.6 percent since May 2022. Within the food at home category, five of the six major grocery store indexes contributed to the rise. The other food at home index, up 11.8 percent, and the cereals and bakery products index, up 7.0 percent, contributed most to the 12-month increase.

The energy index decreased 0.3 percent for the two months ending in May. The decrease was mainly driven by lower prices for natural gas service (-6.2 percent), but prices for electricity also declined (-0.2 percent). The index’s decline over this period was somewhat moderated by an increase in the gasoline index (+1.0 percent).

From May 2022 to May 2023, energy prices fell 17.5 percent. The decrease was mainly due to the gasoline index, down 25.5 percent, the largest 12-month decline in gasoline prices since June 2020. Prices paid for natural gas services (-17.7 percent) also fell, the largest in that index since June 2019. The index for electricity (-2.8 percent) was also down over the year.

The index for all items less food and energy rose 0.8 percent in April and May, after rising 1.9 percent in March and April. Higher prices for owners’ equivalent rent of residences (+1.0 percent), used cars and trucks (+7.6 percent), and rent of primary residence (+0.7 percent) were the largest contributors to the two-month increase. Falling prices for household furnishings and operations (-1.6 percent) and apparel (-1.7 percent) slightly offset the two-month rise.

Over the year, the index for all items less food and energy increased 7.0 percent. All three major categories in the shelter index – owners’ equivalent rent of residences (+9.5 percent), rent of primary residence (+9.1 percent), and lodging away from home – together drove most of the change.

The July 2023 Consumer Price Index for the Dallas-Fort Worth-Arlington area is scheduled to be released on Thursday, August 10, 2023.

The Consumer Price Index (CPI) is a measure of the average change in prices over time in a fixed market basket of goods and services. The Bureau of Labor Statistics publishes CPIs for two population groups: (1) a CPI for All Urban Consumers (CPI-U) which covers approximately 93 percent of the total U.S. population and (2) a CPI for Urban Wage Earners and Clerical Workers (CPI-W) which covers approximately 29 percent of the total U.S. population. The CPI-U includes, in addition to wage earners and clerical workers, groups such as professional, managerial, and technical workers, the self-employed, short-term workers, the unemployed, and retirees and others not in the labor force.

The CPI is based on prices of food, clothing, shelter, and fuels, transportation fares, charges for doctors' and dentists' services, drugs, and the other goods and services that people buy for day-to-day living. Each month, prices are collected in 75 urban areas across the country from about 6,000 housing units and approximately 22,000 retail establishments—department stores, supermarkets, hospitals, filling stations, and other types of stores and service establishments. All taxes directly associated with the purchase and use of items are included in the index.

The index measures price changes from a designated reference date; for most of the CPI-U the reference base is 1982-84 equals 100. An increase of 7 percent from the reference base, for example, is shown as 107.000.  Alternatively, that relationship can also be expressed as the price of a base period market basket of goods and services rising from $100 to $107. For further details see the CPI home page on the Internet at www.bls.gov/cpi and the CPI section of the BLS Handbook of Methods available on the internet at www.bls.gov/opub/hom/cpi/.

In calculating the index, price changes for the various items in each location are averaged together with weights that represent their importance in the spending of the appropriate population group. Local data are then combined to obtain a U.S. city average. Because the sample size of a local area is smaller, the local area index is subject to substantially more sampling and other measurement error than the national index. In addition, local indexes are not adjusted for seasonal influences. As a result, local area indexes show greater volatility than the national index, although their long-term trends are quite similar. NOTE: Area indexes do not measure differences in the level of prices between cities; they only measure the average change in prices for each area since the base period.

The Dallas-Fort Worth-Arlington, TX, Core Based Statistical Area includes the counties of Collin, Dallas, Denton, Ellis, Hood, Hunt, Johnson, Kaufman, Parker, Rockwall, Somervell, Tarrant, and Wise.

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