Food Inflation Is Running Far Below Normal Food at home is half its long-run average. Trimmed-mean PCE is already near 2%. The Warsh Fed hiked anyway. CPI Food at Home is 2.1%. The Fed and Wall Street are screaming inflation crisis. The series is not. St. Louis Fed data: food-at-home CPI inflation was 2.1% year over year in August 2026, roughly half the approximately 4.1% historical average recorded since the early 1970s. That is not an emergency print. It is a below-normal one. The Dallas Fed’s trimmed-mean PCE, the measure that strips out the noisiest price moves, was 2.2% year over year in August, the slowest since 2021, and running under 2% on a recent monthly annualized basis. Underlying inflation is already in the 2% range. Yes, gasoline at the pump is high. That is a negative growth shock, and those dissipate. The Warsh Fed still hiked a quarter point in September, the first increase since 2023. The Powell Fed cut 50 bps in September 2024, weeks before the presidential election, when inflation was worse than this. Screaming crisis over a grocery rate running well under its long-run norm, while trimmed-mean PCE sits near target, is inflation porn, and a midterm year is when it sells. The dataset says 2.1% food and 2.2% trimmed-mean PCE are not a reason to hike.