2026-10-15T20:04:11.777Z / https://www.cnn.com/2026/10/15/politics/trump-using-fictional-inflation-numbers
实际通胀数据对唐纳德·特朗普总统及其政党并不有利。因此特朗普想出了一个“解决方案”：直接使用虚假的通胀数据。
在整个中期选举竞选活动中，特朗普一直在就通胀问题撒谎。除其他内容外，他 falsely 宣称自己“已经遏制了通胀”（9月通胀再次加速）、“物价现在正在大幅下跌”（物价仍在持续上涨），以及如今的物价较前总统乔·拜登2025年1月卸任时“大幅下降”（实际平均上涨了5.4%）。
但在本周的一系列竞选集会演讲和媒体采访中，特朗普更进一步——使用具体但虚假的数据，让通胀看起来比实际情况更好。
在周二阿拉斯加的一场竞选集会上，特朗普声称“过去三个月的通胀率仅为1.7%。想想看，1.7%。他（拜登）的才是真正的通胀；他的真正通胀率达到了19%。”周三，在最新公布的消费者物价指数（CPI）显示9月同比通胀率为3.7%的12个多小时后，特朗普在蒙大拿州的一场集会上再次宣称：“我们接手了美国历史上最严重的通胀，想想看，而现在，过去三个月我们的通胀率只有1.7%——我们已经将其降至……他（拜登）的通胀率是19%，他的真实数字就是19%。”
特朗普的数据荒谬到让人难以弄清他到底在说什么。截至目前，白宫无视了我们要求其做出解释的请求。
但我们可以想到特朗普可能在做的三件事，而没有一件能让他的说法准确无误。海军联邦信用合作社首席经济学家希瑟·朗周四表示：“1.7%的通胀数据没有数据支撑。”
多年来，特朗普一直在编造符合自身政治目的的虚构经济数据，而非真实的经济数据。因此，他很可能只是在撒谎，谎报了最常被讨论的同比通胀率——大肆夸大拜登任内的最高通胀率，同时大幅压低今年最近几个月的通胀率。
在截至2026年的过去三个月的消费者物价指数（CPI）数据中，同比通胀率远高于“1.7%”：9月为3.7%，8月为3.4%，7月为3.4%。个人消费支出（PCE）价格指数尚未公布9月数据，但该指数显示8月同比通胀率为3.4%，7月为3.4%，6月为3.5%。
这并非特朗普首次谎称“过去三个月通胀率为1.7%”。今年5月，他就 falsely 宣称在与伊朗开战“之前”，“过去三个月的通胀率为1.7%”。当时这一说法就有误，白宫也无法提供任何佐证。
拜登任内的同比通胀峰值出现在2022年6月，为9.1%，而非“19%”。那么我们为何怀疑特朗普所谓的“拜登通胀率19%”，可能是（错误地）指代拜登任内的通胀峰值？在2022年的一次演讲中，特朗普称拜登和民主党给美国带来了9.1%的通胀，随后迅速补充道：“不止9.1%。我认为这一数字是两倍。”
事实并非如此。消费者物价指数存在缺陷和局限性，但没有任何依据能证明“真实”通胀率是实际CPI数据的两倍。
累计通胀是指特定时期内物价的总涨幅。根据CPI数据，过去三个月的累计通胀涨幅为1.1%。这并非“1.7%”，因此累计通胀似乎并非特朗普所指，因为当更低的数字对他更有利时，他几乎从未用过更高的数字……
……但即便他指的是累计通胀，他将特朗普与拜登的通胀数据进行对比的说法也极具误导性。因为没有合理的方式能将特朗普任内三个月的通胀与“拜登任内19%的通胀”进行比较。
根据CPI数据，拜登四年总统任期内的物价总涨幅为21.4%，因此“19%”至少还算接近。但将拜登48个月任期内的累计通胀与特朗普任内三个月的累计通胀进行对比，完全是无稽之谈。
截至目前，特朗普上任20个月以来的累计通胀率为5.4%。
这无法支撑特朗普“拜登通胀率19%”的说法。但特朗普“过去三个月通胀率1.7%”的说法，有可能是他不准确地转述了美国国家经济委员会主任凯文·哈塞特本周提出的合理观点——剔除波动较大的食品和能源价格后，核心PCE通胀在6月至8月的三个月期间按年率计算为2%。
这是我们能想到的对特朗普“1.7%”数据最善意的解读，但这仍意味着特朗普没有说实话。他在这些发言中从未提及自己指的是核心通胀而非整体通胀；在油价是推高整体通胀、也是选民不满的主要因素的选举中，这是一个重大遗漏。而且2%也不是“1.7%”。
此外，10月晚些时候公布9月PCE数据时，三个月PCE通胀率预计将大幅上升。周三CPI数据公布后，三个月核心CPI按年率计算跃升至3.4%——此前的2%数据在计算中被9月数据取代后，这一数字出现了上涨。
朗表示，9月的数据“极大地改变了趋势。8月三个月年化趋势看起来尚可，主要原因是6月和7月汽油价格下跌。”她还表示，虽然提及核心通胀是她对特朗普数据来源的“最佳猜测”，“但我还是算不出1.7%这个数字”，除非再剔除更多价格类别。
还有一点：拜登并没有留给特朗普史上最严重的通胀
特朗普在一场又一场活动中宣称，他从拜登手中接手了美国历史上最严重的通胀。事实并非如此，正如CNN及其他媒体多次指出的那样。
拜登任期最后一个完整月——2024年12月的同比通胀率为2.9%，2025年1月特朗普就职当月的通胀率为3%。以历史标准来看，这些数字并不引人注目，远未达到创纪录水平，且低于今年初特朗普发动对伊朗战争以来每个月的通胀率。
特朗普可以合理地说，拜登任内9.1%的同比通胀峰值是40多年来的最高水平。但即便这9.1%的通胀率，也远低于历史最高值23.7%，以及吉米·卡特总统任期内1980年达到的14.8%的峰值。而当时的通胀率在特朗普再次就职前已大幅回落。
从拜登政府上台到卸任，物价累计涨幅也并非美国历史最高；这一涨幅还不到卡特任期内累计通胀率的一半。
CNN的艾丽西亚·华莱士为本报道撰稿。
The White House won’t even try to explain Trump’s fictional inflation numbers
2026-10-15T20:04:11.777Z / https://www.cnn.com/2026/10/15/politics/trump-using-fictional-inflation-numbers
The actual inflation numbers aren’t good for President Donald Trump and his party. So Trump has come up with something of a solution: just use fake inflation numbers.
Trump has been lying about inflation throughout the midterm election campaign. Among other things, he has falsely declared he has “already stopped the inflation” (it accelerated again in September), that “prices are now coming way down” (they have continued rising), and that prices are now “way down” from when former president Joe Biden left office in January 2025 (they are up 5.4% on average).
But in a series of rally speeches and comments to the press this week, Trump has gone a step further – deploying specific but phony numbers to make inflation seem better than it is.
In a Tuesday rally speech in Alaska, Trump claimed that there was just “1.7 inflation in the last three months. Think of that, 1.7. He (Biden) had real inflation; he had real inflation of 19%.” On Wednesday, more than 12 hours after newly released Consumer Price Index figures showed a 3.7% year-over-year inflation rate in September, Trump repeated in a rally speech in Montana: “We inherited the worst inflation in history, think of it, and now, the last three months, we have 1.7 – we have it down to – he (Biden) had 19%, his real number’s 19%.”
Trump’s figures are so bewildering that it is hard to figure out what exactly he is even talking about. The White House has so far ignored our requests for an explanation.
But we can think of three possible things Trump could conceivably be doing here and none of them would make his claims accurate. Heather Long, chief economist for Navy Federal Credit Union, said Thursday that “the 1.7% inflation figure is not supported by the data.”
For years, Trump has invented fictional economic numbers that work better for his purposes than the actual economic numbers. So it’s very possible he’s just lying about the year-over-year inflation rates that tend to be the most commonly discussed – wildly exaggerating the highest rate under Biden and significantly reducing the most recent rates this year.
In the last three months of 2026 for which Consumer Price Index (CPI) data is available, the year-over-year inflation rate was far higher than “1.7%”: 3.7% in September, 3.4% in August and 3.4% in July. September data isn’t yet available for the Personal Consumption Expenditures (PCE) price index, but that index shows the year-over-year rate was 3.4% in August, 3.4% in July and 3.5% in June.
This wouldn’t be the first time he has made a false claim about having “1.7%” inflation for three months. In May, he falsely claimed that “just before the war” with Iran, “for the last three months, inflation was at 1.7%.” That was wrong, too, and the White House could not offer any substantiation at the time.
Peak year-over-year inflation under Biden was 9.1%, in June 2022, not “19%.” So why do we suspect that Trump might be (incorrectly) referring to peak Biden-era inflation when he claims Biden was at “19%”? In a 2022 speech, Trump said Biden and Democrats had given the country 9.1% inflation, then quickly added, “It’s not 9.1%. I believe it’s double that.”
It’s not. The Consumer Price Index has its flaws and limitations, but there is no basis for any claim that the “real” figure is double the actual CPI figure.
Cumulative inflation is the total increase in prices over a given period. There has been a 1.1% cumulative increase over the last three months, according to the CPI. That’s not a “1.7%” increase, so cumulative inflation doesn’t seem like what Trump is referring to, since he almost never uses a higher number when a lower number would be more helpful to him…
…but even if he was referring to cumulative inflation, his Trump-vs.-Biden comparison would be very deceptive. That’s because there is no reasonable way to compare three-month inflation under Trump to “19%” inflation under Biden.
The total increase in prices over Biden’s four-year term as president was 21.4%, according to the CPI, so “19%” is at least in the ballpark. But it would be completely nonsensical to contrast Biden-era cumulative inflation over 48 months with Trump-era cumulative inflation over three months.
Cumulative inflation during this Trump term to date, through 20 months, is 5.4%.
This wouldn’t do anything to support Trump’s “19%” figure for Biden. But it’s possible that Trump’s “1.7%” figure for the last three months is his inaccurate rendition of a fair point National Economic Council director Kevin Hassett made this week – “core” PCE inflation, which excludes volatile food and energy prices, was at an annualized rate of 2% for the three months from June through August.
This is the most generous reading of Trump’s “1.7%” figure we can think of, but it would still mean Trump was not telling the truth. He didn’t say in any of these comments that he was referring to core inflation rather than overall inflation; during an election in which gas prices are a major driver in overall inflation and a major factor in voter discontent, that’s a big omission. And 2% is not “1.7%.”
Also, the three-month PCE rate is widely expected to increase when the September figures for that index are released later in October. After the September CPI figures were released Wednesday, three-month core CPI jumped to an annualized rate of 3.4% – rising from the previous 2% after the September data replaced the June data in the calculation.
Long said the September data “changed the trend sharply. A key reason that 3-month annualized trend looked decent in August was due to falling gas prices in June and July.” And she said that while a reference to core inflation is her “best guess” about where Trump got his number, “I still can’t come up with 1.7%” without stripping out yet more price categories.
And one more thing: Biden didn’t leave Trump the worst inflation ever
Trump has been saying at event after event that he inherited the worst inflation in US history from Biden. He didn’t, as CNN and others have repeatedly noted.
The year-over-year inflation rate was 2.9% in Biden’s last full month in office, December 2024, and 3% in January 2025, the month Trump took over partway through. Those numbers are unremarkable by historical standards, nowhere near any record, and lower than the rate every month since Trump launched a war with Iran early this year.
Trump could fairly say the 9.1% peak year-over-year inflation under Biden was the highest in more than 40 years. But even that 9.1% rate was much lower than the all-time high, 23.7%, or the highest point of Jimmy Carter’s presidency, 14.8%, which was reached in 1980. And the rate then fell significantly before Trump returned to office.
The cumulative increase in prices from the beginning of Biden’s administration to the end was also not the highest in US history; it was less than half of cumulative inflation during Carter’s term.
CNN’s Alicia Wallace contributed to this article.
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