The Consumer Price Index (CPI) rose 2.2% on a year-over-year basis in March, up from a 1.1% gain in February. A significant proportion of this increase was attributable to a steep decline in prices in March 2020, as the monthly CPI rose 0.5% in March 2021. On a seasonally adjusted monthly basis, the CPI increased 0.1% in March. Excluding energy, the CPI rose 1.1% on a year-over-year basis. As Canada marked the end of the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic, price growth in March 2021 was accentuated by what is known as base-year effects, originating in March 2020. The broad decline in prices in spring 2020, when ... (full story)

Statistics Canada says the annual pace of inflation jumped higher in March due in large part to a plunge in prices a year ago at the start of the pandemic. The agency says the consumer price index in March was up 2.2 per cent compared with a year ago. The increase compared with a 1.1 per cent year-over-year increase in February, which was then a pandemic-era high. The figures for March marked a new high, but one that saw prices compared against a year ago when the first wave of COVID-19 crashed on Canada's shores. March gas prices, for example, were up 35.3 per cent compared with the same month last year when prices ... (full story)