Do you feel like no matter how hard you work, it’s harder and harder to get ahead?
There’s a good explanation for that. And it’s maddening.
The government intentionally & dramatically underreports the true cost of living, and that fake low number is what most employers use when they set the wages they pay.
So your paycheck isn’t growing nearly as fast as it needs to in order to stay ahead of inflation.
Ed Butowsky created the Chapwood Index to calculate and track a more realistic measurement of the true cost of living that American’s experience “in the real world”, as an alternative to the laughably phony Consumer Price Index (CPI) published by the US government’s Bureau of Labor and Statistics.
Butowsky’s weighted index is based on the 500 most used items by Americans, including taxes, energy and food — which are *not* included in the official CPI. It also calculates the cost of living regionally, revealing the reality on the ground for those living in/near the 50 largest metro regions in the US.
The average annual cost of living increase calculated by the Chapwood Index is around 10%. For comparison, the CPI claims it has increased less than 2% per year for the past decade. That’s over 5x less.
Which number more accurately reflects the reality you’ve seen in your own household expenses? If you buy groceries, go to the doctor’s, need a roof over your head, drive a car or have children to support and educate — odds are high the Chapwood Index does.
by mki-2-2 
