As we previously reported, gas prices are on the rise, but Jen Psaki was all about spinning how you weren’t really seeing what you thought you were seeing. You really haven’t seen a 60 cent rise in the average price since Joe Biden took office. Nope, not at all.

Unfortunately, it’s not just gas. Prices are rising across the board, as Fox reported — the highest yearly increase since 1992.

Overall, U.S. consumer prices in April were up about 3.1% compared with February 2020, the month before the pandemic shut down the economy. Data published Friday showed a separate measure of inflation surging 3.6% last month, and underlying inflation excluding volatile gas and food prices gaining 3.1%, its largest annual increase since 1992.

And that may be only the beginning. A survey from the University of Michigan on Friday showed consumers’ one-year inflation expectations shot up to 4.6% in May from 3.4% in April.

Prices are expected to keep rising for much of the summer, pushed up by, among other things, bottlenecks crimping supply of both materials and labor, and surging consumer demand.

While costs of flying and lodging are down, virtually all the other leisure-related prices that you might be concerned about over this weekend have shot up. According to Reuters, ground beef prices are up 7%; hotdogs are up 11%.

Summer Sticker Shock. Prices are expected to keep rising this summer, pushed up by bottlenecks for materials/labor + surging consumer demand, Reuters reports.
The “Memorial Day Weekend price index” showes leisure-related prices up about 4.3% since the pandemic began. pic.twitter.com/pNjQk6jocN

— Bridge Ratings (@bridgeratings) May 31, 2021

Now we have more bad news from Paul Krugman. We start with a basic operating principle that Krugman is virtually always wrong.

Krugman is arguing that we shouldn’t get upset about the rising prices.

One of the minor annoyances of frequent punditry is how often you're falsely accused of moving the goalposts. Right now, some of us are cautioning not to read much if anything into inflation numbers 1/ https://t.co/IoSOnU1cyy

— Paul Krugman (@paulkrugman) May 29, 2021

And immediately you get accused of making ex-post excuses, even though we were warning months ago about the likelihood of transitory price blips 2/

— Paul Krugman (@paulkrugman) May 29, 2021

Here’s one from March 3/ https://t.co/yCx1PrXYwX

— Paul Krugman (@paulkrugman) May 29, 2021

And a specific warning that traditional core inflation would be misleading 4/ https://t.co/138CyWqKuQ

— Paul Krugman (@paulkrugman) May 29, 2021

Not a big deal. But really, everything we’ve seen so far is pretty much in line with a benign scenario — not saying that things can’t go wrong, but they haven’t so far 5/

— Paul Krugman (@paulkrugman) May 29, 2021

So, just like Jen Psaki, Krugman is about downplaying what you see in front of your face. And watch him move the goalposts by talking about traditional standards like “core inflation” (the core personal consumer expenditures, “core PCE”) being “misleading” as a determinant.

"Economist"👇🏻🤔 https://t.co/KHDinfY00o

— Sister Toldjah 😁 (@sistertoldjah) May 29, 2021

Analyst Gordon Johnson pummeled Krugman, saying he was trying to deny the evidence we can all see and laying a few facts on him.

And you can say “transitory” all you want… but poor people don’t care for all the economic mumbojumbo. The purchasing power of their dollar is imploding, while their pay is stagnant, so we can buy more solar panels/rare earths made in China, and pay billionaires A LOT more. pic.twitter.com/YmPTnAxokd

— Gordon Johnson (@GordonJohnson19) May 29, 2021

Not to mention the charts show when a lot of the prices started soaring — strange how you can trace a lot of them to starting to go up after the end of January. I wonder what was happening then?

Now, of course, if President Donald Trump were in office, Krugman would be screaming his head off about how we were heading for the dumpster because of this. But now, under Biden, “not a big deal” and “transitory blip.”

If we apply our basic principle about Krugman being wrong, then unfortunately that means we may need to start worrying.