-->Reuters
U.S. Treasury chief unworried by inflation
Thursday April 15, 7:26 am ET


WASHINGTON, April 14 (Reuters) - U.S. Treasury Secretary John Snow said on Thursday he was not particularly worried about inflation pressures in the United States.

"Inflation is still modest, as reflected in (Wednesday's Labor Department) report, and we have the lowest inflation in, what, 40, 45 years. So I'm not particularly concerned about it at this point," Snow said in an interview on CNBC Television.

"I think there's still a lot of running room in this economy," he said, referring to excess capacity in U.S. factories and still-intense competition among businesses that kept companies from big price rises.

The Labor Department said on Wednesday that its consumer price index, the most widely used gauge of U.S. inflation, rose a surprisingly large 0.5 percent in March, outstripping the 0.3 percent gain Wall Street expected. The closely watched core CPI, which strips out often-volatile food and energy costs, rose 0.4 percent, the biggest increase since November 2001.