As is often the case, I cannot verify this claim made by EJ Antoni, Chief Economist for Heritage Foundation. What is true is that the price of natural gas (piped) has declined. But not for electricity. And roughly 42% of households are heated/cooled by electricity (a rising share), compared to 47% for natural gas. In addition, for lighting etc. you’d need to draw on electricity.
Figure 1: CPI natural gas (piped) (blue), CPI electricity (red), simple arithmetic average (black), all s.a., in logs 2025M01=0. Source: BLS and author’s calculations.
First off, even if little Antoni’s claim were true, it would amount to cherry picking. Utilitiy prices down, but gasoline, insurance, grocery, healthcare, eating out and so on, all up, still amounts to high and rising inflation.
If the lack of a “utilities” price index makes little Antoni’s claim dubious, there is a “fuels and utilities” index:
https://fred.stlouisfed.org/graph/?g=1WRAD
Up 1.9% since February. That annualizes to 8%.
By the way, when I check daily prices, instead of monthly averages, natural gas futures are up 18% from just before the war on Iran:
https://tradingeconomics.com/commodity/natural-gas
If when and how the price is measured makes that big a difference, then little Antoni is cherry picking twice over.
Little Antoni shows a chart of natural gas prices, not utility prices, in his twit, so maybe he he’s lying, claiming utility prices are down when he means natural gas. He also argues, which is to say, he lies, that if oil production had risen under Biden, we’d all be jolly. U.S.oil production rose under Biden, and Biden didn’t start the war that guys like little Antoni are trying to diminish. Little Antoni is doing what the war-criminal-in-chief has been doing – blaming Biden as a distraction from the harm the war criminal has done.
I can honestly say that the inflation under Biden was hardly felt in our household. it had very little impact on our day to day living. however, the inflation over the past year has been quite impactful. insurance is absurd. food costs are significant. you cannot get a fast food meal for under $10-which maybe is a good thing for my overall health. I am eating at home and healthier as a result. gas makes us think twice about longer trips for food/shopping. trump inflation is indeed impactful. and beginning to cause long term financial concerns.