How Disruption in BLS Data Collection May Impact Accurate Price Change Measurement

Recent data reveal a striking divergence between appliance price trends measured by the OpenBrand CPI and the BLS CPI, raising important questions about data quality, sampling, and methodological challenges.

This deviation emerged immediately following the government shutdown, a period that likely disrupted standard data collection and processing workflows. In particular, the Bureau of Labor Statistics may have faced challenges related to reduced sample sizes for appliance pricing and limitations in applying hedonic adjustments when key product observations were missing. Both factors can materially affect month-to-month price estimates, especially in categories like appliances where product turnover and model replacement are high.

The resulting price movements in the BLS CPI were unusually large. Appliance prices fell 5.1% month-over-month in December, followed by a 4.4% increase in January, both on a non-seasonally adjusted basis. These back-to-back swings are exceptionally large by historical standards and are what one might expect annually, rather than in a given month. The movements contrast sharply with the more stable and continuous pricing trends observed in the OpenBrand CPI, which is built on high-frequency, broad-based market pricing data.

OpenBrand’s depth and breadth of data across the consumer durables industry provides a highly accurate, real-time view of pricing and promotional activity. The OpenBrand CPI leverages millions of continuously observed price points across retailers, brands, and SKUs, allowing us to capture true market dynamics without reliance on small samples or statistical inference. As a result, the OpenBrand CPI is immune to disruptions caused by government shutdowns and does not depend on hedonic adjustments to estimate missing products. This ensures a cleaner, timelier, and more reliable signal of underlying price trends.

Taken together, the magnitude and timing of the BLS swings strongly suggest that temporary measurement disruptions, rather than fundamental market forces, drove recent volatility in appliance price measurement in the BLS CPI. If so, future releases may show partial normalization as standard sampling and processing resume.

We will be paying close attention to this deviation over the coming months, waiting to see if official appliance price measures stabilize and converge back toward broader market-based pricing signals. Understanding whether this episode reflects short-term noise or deeper structural challenges will be critical for accurately interpreting inflation trends in appliance pricing for the remainder of 2026H1.