> And that's fine, because the CPI's job is to measure how prices have changed (ie. inflation), not wealth inequality. Allow me to elaborate. Does it seem odd

> And that's fine, because the CPI's job is to measure how prices have changed (ie. inflation), not wealth inequality. Allow me to elaborate. Does it seem odd to you that "real wages" (i.e. inflation adjusted) have barely budged in decades, and even slowly increased? The wages aren't decreasing, despite people apparently being able to buy a nice house and live the American dream on a median wage up until around the early 90's. The way CPI is calculated is that it surveys the median purchaser about their purchases (how much they bought and how much it cost). And as prices increase faster than wages, the median purchaser is spending a larger percentage of their paycheck on goods. More expensive purchasers / nicer goods are largely excluded from these surveys. For the last decade or so, it's probably pretty much all their money. That is NOT captured in CPI. They can only spend up to their entire paycheck, so inflation is limited to median wage growth. And then the hedonic adjustments can be used to help the government meet its targets ("when a measure becomes a target it no longer serves as an accurate measure").