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Economist worried as RBNZ takes 'sledgehammer' to inflation

17:07 pm on 13 April 2022

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Is the cost of food giving you a bellyache? Figures released today show prices are up 7.6 percent on the same time last year.

It's the biggest jump in more than a decade. Mortgages will be costing more too.

On Wednesday the Reserve Bank raised the official cash rate to 1.5 percent. It's the fourth consecutive jump since October and there are warnings there's more to come.

RBNZ's goal is to keep inflation between one and three percent but its romping ahead at almost double that.

Kiwibank chief economist Jarrod Kerr told Checkpoint he's worried about the impact on households as the RBNZ "takes a sledgehammer" to inflation by raising the OCR to 1.5 percent. 

"The good news here is that we've got a very tight labor market and wages are rising. But that doesn't mean that [people] won't have to rein in their spending."

He said he doesn't think RBNZ needs to move so hard.

"We've seen a drop in consumer confidence and we've seen a drop in business confidence which worries me, but they have decided that they want to get on top of inflation and inflation expectations."