Government charges, the CPI and

Conceptually, inflation is best understood as on-going erosion of the purchasing power of money. Consumer price inflation is generally measured as changes in the weighted average of the money prices of a basket of selected goods and services. This raises questions concerning the choice of goods and services which constitute that basket, what sort of price changes should be counted as part of the general ‘inflation process’, and whether all price changes should be viewed in the same way, irrespective of why they have occurred.