Inflation rose to the highest level in four decades in January in the gauge preferred by the Federal Reserve, increasing pressure on the central bank to move quickly to curb price gains.

Prices rose 6.1% in the year ending in January, according to the Personal Consumption Expenditures Price Index updated Friday by the Bureau of Economic Analysis. Inflation is up three-tenths of a percentage point from the month before and at a rate not seen since the end of the era of the Great Inflation in early 1982.

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