U.S. Labor Secretary Marty Walsh was unable to name a single thing President Joe Biden is doing to address the rapid rise of inflation during an interview this week.
In his interview on Bloomberg, Walsh was asked what the Biden administration can do in the short-term to lower inflation. In his response, Walsh used the COVID-19 pandemic, which is no longer the threat it posed back in 2020, and the ongoing supply chain crisis as reasons for why inflation is still rising.
"Well, I think — I think if you’re talking about inflation, I think what’s happening here is — I mean, we’re in the midst of a worldwide pandemic, certainly, that’s one. We’re in the midst of dealing with supply chain issues. Now we have a major conflict in the world that we’re — all eyes of the world are on the Ukrainian people and Ukraine," said Walsh.
Walsh did not list a single action item that is being done to address the issue – only that they will be taking actions of some kind over the "next weeks and months."
"And I think that as we move forward here — and the question earlier, as oil supply — as oil supply gets cut back from Russia, if that’s what ultimately happens, we’re going to see an increase in gas prices. And I think that there’s a point here that we have to — we have to just continue to move forward," he continued. "The President has been very clear on bringing down inflation, he talked about it at the State of the Union, but we’re living in very interesting dynamic and times are happening here. So, again, there’s lots of conversations and lots of actions that we’ll be taking over the next weeks and months."
The average price at the pump now stands at $3.83 for regular gas, nearly a 20 cent increase from earlier this week, where the average price was $3.66. The average price nationwide last year stood at $2.74 and even a month ago it was $3.42.