What is contained in the virtual shopping basket in calculating the inflation rate in the UK?
Q. The official rate of inflation has just increased to 3%, but anybody filling their shopping trolley, paying household bills, running a car or taking public transport will consider this low rate a figment of someone's imagination. In light of this, I can only imagine the virtual shopping basket contains PCs, DVD players, big screen TVs, MP3 players and digital cameras. Can anybody shed any light on this?
Asked by jamieroth - Wed May 14 11:46:23 2008 - - 1 Answers - 1 Comments

A. I don't know the exact list, but it contains many, many different items. The list is revised every few years so that yes, it most probably does contain items like PCs and digital cameras now - and it has had items deleted which are no longer relevant (in the 1950s it used to contain a pound of lard!). It contains mainly groceries and consumer goods. I believe petrol is included, but household bills and so on are not. You should be able to google it to find out - I remember reading it in Metro either last year or the year before, so I don't believe it's some big state secret.
Answered by Cari - Wed May 14 12:18:11 2008