That growth was the most rapid in 12 months and brought the overall index higher than its prerecession peak for the first time. The Philadelphia Fed’s Business Outlook Survey of regional manufacturing, which is a reliable indicator of national manufacturing trends, has also been in positive territory for seven months, and our firms expect continued expansion in manufacturing activity over the next six months.
This gives me some hope that business fixed investment, which has been generally lackluster during the course of the recovery, will pick up somewhat this year. Inflation has been running below the FOMC’s long-run goal of 2 percent. The year-over-year change in the price index for personal consumption expenditures, or PCE inflation, is the Fed’s preferred measure.