Inflation pressures continue to bubble through the U.S. economy, as the pace of wholesale inflation over the past year moved up to 7.8% from 7.3% for the 12-months ended in July, according to data released Thursday by the Bureau of Labor Statistics. It marks the largest jump since 12-month data was first calculated in November 2010.

The producer price index jumped 1% in July, which was higher than the 0.6% advance that economists at the Wall Street Journal had forecast.

It was the sixth consecutive month that wholesale prices have surged. The producer price index had risen 1% in June and 0.8% in May.

The Labor Department reported on Wednesday that consumer prices rose 5.4% in July, the fastest pace since August 2008.

“While this data should reassure markets that inflation isn’t on a relentless upward trend, make no mistake this inflation report is still red hot,” said Seema Shah, chief strategist at Principal Global Investors.

Prices for food, shelter, and new vehicles all increased in July with the food index rising 0.7% while the energy index rose 1.6%, with a 2.4% increase in gas prices. Final demand services increased at 1.1%, the largest on record. Almost half the increase was because of a 1.7% rise in margins for final demand trade services, which measure changes in margins received by wholesale retailers.

Approximately 20% of the increase in the given margins are for cars and car parts retailing, which increased 11.2%. Airline services and hospital outpatient care were some of the indexes that experienced gains.

While inflation may concern some economists, when controlled it is considered a healthy byproduct of a high-growth economy.

“Yes I’m worried about inflation, and yes the fears of inflation are overblown,” Richard Wolff, an economics professor at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, said on the podcast Breaking Points.

“Inflation is a major economic event, it never has one cause or one key cause, lots of things have to come together to produce inflation. We are a society so dependent on credit that we are flooding the economy with the money to sustain credit, that money could move and become something chasing goods and services and produce inflation,” Wolff said.

Price Inflation