Consumers continued to feel the pinch at grocery stores and gasoline stations in April as higher prices pushed up a widely used index of inflation to the fastest 12-month pace since the later part of 2008, according to government figures released yesterday.
The Labor Department said the consumer price index, the most widely used measure of inflation, was up 0.4 percent in April from March, and up 3.2 percent from a year earlier.
The 12-month figure represents the biggest jump in the index in any 12-month period since October 2008.
Analysts had forecast the same monthly rise but a slightly smaller increase for the year, at 3.1 percent.
Food and gasoline price rises accounted for most of the increases, with gasoline accounting for almost half of the month-to-month rise...
