NC State economist predicts we'll have to 'tighten our belts' for inflation

Two new reports tracking inflation and the state of the U.S. economy are due Wednesday morning.

N.C. State economist Mike Walden said he’s expecting to see a little easing in the inflation rate, but it may be short-lived.

"People should understand that we're probably looking at a challenging six to eight month period, where in order to squeeze out inflation, we're going to have to unfortunately tighten our belts," Walden said.

A clear indicator of that is gas prices, which jumped a total of 20 cents within the past week. Wednesday's state average is $3.51 compared to $3.31 last week.

Experts are expecting the September issue of the Producer Price index and the Consumer Price Index to show a moderate dip in wholesale prices.

However, they are not expecting it to deliver an “all-clear” signal on inflation that would warrant Federal Reserve officials to pull back from their current pace of rate tightening.

Walden predicts the holiday shopping season may look a little different for folks stirring away from purchasing the big ticket items and focusing more on essential goods and services.