Even though the economy was already in a recession in 2008, the situation was still better than it is today.

Economic growth tends to go hand-in-hand with inflation - people are doing better, they feel richer and buy more stuff and push prices up because they are competing for the same limited number of goods.

Despite the fact that gasoline prices zoomed higher in the spring of 2008, the government reported that consumer prices only rose 0.4 percent that March; 0.2 percent that April and 0.5 percent that May.

Those are all very modest increases - and they were kept at acceptable levels because of the same seasonal adjustment flaw I'm now telling you about.

But here's the real problem with seasonal adjustments like this: What the computers give, they have to take away.

By definition, if the effects of increased gasoline prices are understated in the spring they need to be overstated at some other time.

In the end, the effects of these seasonal adjustments have to be neutralized. They must offset each other by the end of the year.

In a column published on May 20, 2008, I mentioned my suspicions that inflation would be going much higher in the months to come. And I quoted a senior economist at the BLS who confirmed my reasoning. The inflation numbers soon rose just like he and I had expected.

When consumer prices came out for June 2008 there was a monstrous jump of 0.9 percent from the month before. That was followed by a 0.7 percent climb for that July.

So are the BLS' computers screwed up again? Have they been understating the rise in energy prices?

Last week I asked one of the people at the BLS who is instrumental in putting together the monthly consumer price report. He said that the computers "probably" have been weighing gasoline price increases too lightly.

And unless gasoline prices suddenly decline in the months ahead - and there was a drop yesterday in gas futures contracts - all those spring understatements will start catching up in the CPI.

And the amount of inflation being reported could rise uncomfortably. Here's where you start to care about this column.

I've predicted that interest rates were going to climb because the nation's economy would look better in spring than it really is. And rates have gone up - a lot.

But now the inflation numbers could have an added impact.

If the BLS computers are messed up, you should not only expect the cost of borrowing money to rise more aggressively but you can also count on Wall Street being flummoxed.

If I'm right, you can say that you knew all about this because you saw the sandwich board.

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