Source or Calc advice for an actual inflation (Core CPI is bunk)
Doing some salary analysis on my W2 to compare inflation against raise percentages over my time in role. I'm getting stuck on inflation though. Core CPI is a nonsense made-up number, so is there a place to pull or a way to calculate actual inflation without food, energy, and housing stripped out? I don't know about you, but I can't actually live without food, energy, and housing so core CPI is less than useful. I'm hoping for a an annual number I can just find, but I'll do a calc if needed. I spent a few hours google searching but didn't find any easily scraped numbers. My guess is I'll have to use core CPI and add back in food (best I could find was https://www.usinflationcalcula... though I find the number in the 12-month graph at the top really suspect) and energy from regional Fed or BLS data, but thought I'd check with the brain trust to see if there's a better option. My output doesn't have to be hugely accurate, but I'm hoping for something I can use that's closer to reality than core.
Any ideas?