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Anthony Jackson, USA TODAY Americans struggling with Other costs, especially rent, are still climbing. th straight month in May as grocery price increases eased again and gas more than reversed the previous month’s rise. Overall, "The embers of inflation keep fading," says Bernard Baumohl, chief global economist for the Economic Outlook Group. Core prices, which exclude volatile food and energy items and better capture longer-term trends, have been tougher to tame. They rose 0.4% for the third-straight month. Still, that lowered the annual increase from 5.5% to 5.3%, the lowest since November 2021. The report presents a quandary for a Federal Reserve that’s expected Wednesday to pause its 14-month campaign of aggressive interest rate hikes aimed at corralling inflation to assess their economic impact. While price increases broadly have eased, the Fed is more concerned about stubbornly elevated core inflation. As a result, some Fed officials have said they were leaning toward skipping a rate increase this week but hiking again in July. Economist Jason Schenker of Prestige Economics says overall price increases slowed so substantially in May that the Fed will likely hold off further rate bumps this year. But noting persistent core price gains, Paul Ashworth of Capital Economics expects another hike in July. • Inflation in the Midwest shows food costs continuing to rise • Inflation in the West continues to hit consumers, even as prices cool elsewhere • Inflation in the Northe...