Ask HN: Is it time to measure Inflation and CPI without the government?

The Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) cancelled the October CPI report and delayed several other releases. Key series such as CPI, real earnings, state JOLTS, and county wage data now have gaps or shifted timelines.

Independent analysts note that missing a full month breaks continuity in the most widely used inflation signal in the United States. Forecasting models lose a key input. The Fed will make its December decision without two consecutive inflation prints.

My assumption is that we should not depend on a single centralized (potentially untrusted) source for something this important.

Private data sources already track groceries, rent, CPG pricing, energy, e-commerce, shipping, and wages in near real time.

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What would it take to build a community-driven, open CPI alternative that is transparent, reproducible, and tamper-resistant?

Some starting points:

  * Multiple contributors could publish item-level price feeds (groceries, rent, utilities, services).
  * Weighted baskets could be open and versioned.
  * Methods could be fixed, auditable, and stable over time.
  * Aggregation could be public code using public data where available.
  * Licensed private datasets could be added for specific categories.
  * Output could be monthly, weekly, or daily depending on the data.

A decentralized CPI would not replace official CPI, but could offer a continuous, independent signal.

I'm looking for practical approaches: data sources, weighting schemes, methods, and any existing open projects that are doing this today.

Yes, it would be great to have a second source but no one has the resources the government has to gatherthe data. They do a pretty good job and they try to be as accurate as possible. I can't see any another organization gathering the data without needing to be greatly compensated.

As far as trust, there have always been people that have and will criticize the results but they only have a small view of the prices which doesn't give a true view of inflation. So their criticism is invalid.

The problem with a decentralized version is that people will need to be compensated. People might get together to do it a few times but for it to be useful it needs to get done for as long as there's an American economy. It won't happen without some kind of compensation.

For rent, scraping property rental websites would work. Same for grocery/etc.

>we should not depend on a single centralized (potentially untrusted) source

>Is it time

[1972]?