housing, healthcare, food, clothing. How the CPI works is that necessities are mixed with nice to haves. Like large TVs and smartphones. LCD TVs price is down, smartphones price is down (and they will include things like size of the TV or speed of the smartphone to proof it's cheaper even when it isn't). Healthcare prices are tremendously up, food prices are up, yes housing prices are up, they have been going up for 10 years. And the salaries are the same. CPI is an useless metric. If my health insurance was 500 bucks and is 1300 bucks, childcare was 1,100 usd and is 1,500 usd -- what do I care about LCD TV being down? Or being able to get 5 times faster smartphone for the same price compared to 3 years ago?

In the USA the middle class and white collar (middle upper class) now too -- are getting poorer by the year.

Don't believe me? See why Trump won.