Consumers think inflation is far higher than it really is: CBS

People in the Netherlands believe prices are rising by around 8% a year, which is actually three times higher than the real rate, national statistics office CBS has said.

Measured inflation has hovered around 3% for the past two and a half years, but “perceived” inflation – how fast consumers think prices are going up – has stayed at about 8% over the same period.

Consumers typically overestimate inflation, the CBS said, but the gap has grown much wider since the energy crisis of 2022. Perceived inflation is now roughly double its pre-2022 level: in 2017, for example, consumers put inflation at 2% to 3%, when the real figure was below 2%.

Inflation peaked at 14.5% in September 2022 and had fallen to 4.4% by March 2023, but consumers continued to estimate it at 15% until the middle of that year. In June this year, inflation stood at 2.9%, while perceived inflation was 8%.

The CBS also found that more people expect inflation to go up. Expectations have been climbing recently especially, probably because of tensions in the Middle East and worries about fuel prices, which pushed inflation higher in the spring, CBS said.

In April, 55% of people surveyed expected inflation to rise, the highest proportion since March 2022. By June, that had fallen back to 32.5%.