Unfortunately for consumers, Insee does not really provide any optimistic signals for the coming months, even though its quarterly study is limited to forecasts for the second quarter of 2022. The latest final consumer price index is from March 2022, at 4.5% year-on-year. In April, Insee anticipates inflation of 4.8%, then expects 5.2% in May and 5.4% in June.
No slowdown in sight. Even though Insee acknowledges that the development throughout the rest of 2022 is quite difficult to foresee “accurately,” due to a very uncertain international context because of “geopolitical developments around Russia.”
Insee also quantifies the impact of “price shield” measures on gas and electricity prices combined with the “fuel rebate” on gasoline prices: without these anti-inflation measures, “the forecast for May would be raised by about 2 percentage points and thus exceed 7%.”
In the second quarter, Insee anticipates a decrease in the purchasing power of French households by 0.5%, following an erosion of purchasing power by 1.5% over the first three months of 2022.
