U.S. consumer inflation unexpectedly eased in November, according to figures released by the Labor Department on Dec. 18.

The Bureau of Labor Statistics’ Consumer Price Index — the first since October due to the 43-day government shutdown that spanned Oct. 1-Nov. 13 — showed that the topline CPI figure rose 2.7% year-over-year, which is well below the 3.1% forecast from economists polled by the Wall Street Journal, and down from September’s 3.0%.

Month-over-month, November consumer prices increased 0.2%, up from 0.3% in September.

U.S. Core Inflation Rate Change Year-Over-Year

The BLS did not conduct an October CPI survey due to the shutdown.

Removing volatile food and energy costs, core consumer prices increased 2.6% year-over-year — likewise below forecasts of 3.0%.

It should be noted, though, economists flagged that a technical fix the BLS used to combat data collection issued caused by the shutdown may have skewed the November CPI figure downward.

“The BLS may have held fixed a number of prices it was not able to collect in October, which likely means a material downward bias in the current numbers that will be reversed in coming months as full price collection resumes,” JPMorgan Senior Economist Michael Hanson told Financial Times. 

The BLS’ November report noted that it uses nonsurvey data sources to make calculations for a few indexes, but that it was able to retroactively acquire most of the nonsurvey data for October. CPI data collection resumed on Nov. 14.