The term personal consumption expenditures refer to a measure of imputed household expenditures defined for a period of time.
Personal income and the PCE Price Index reading are released monthly in the Bureau of Economic Analysis, Personal Income and Outlays report. Personal consumption expenditures support the reporting of the PCE Price Index, which measures price changes in consumer goods and services exchanged in the U.S. economy.
The PCE Price Index became the primary inflation index in 2012 used by the U.S. Federal Reserve when making monetary policy decisions.1 It is comparable to the Consumer Price Index which also focuses on consumer prices.
Other measures of inflation also tracked by economists can include the Producer Price Index and the Gross Domestic Product Price Index.