The average in the first one is not specified: but if it is a mean and not a median it is too high in comparison with the second: that is true. The point I am trying to make is that the inflation applied to houses is about 710% and that for wages is about 567%. The inflation is in the house price increase and is not called inflation: so that part of inflation is hidden: as is the huge inflation in remuneration for the top 10% of earners.
To put it another way, the nationwide survey also mentioned that the cost of mortgage interest rose from 11% of household income in 2003: to 20% in 2008 (I think:might have been 2010)
Inflation refers to a general rise in prices: where it is confined to one sector it is often excluded from the government's preferred measure (though I think there are also measures which include house prices, I do not think that is the usual measure)
But the fact it is not in the general inflation measure does not mean it is not inflation in all practical ways: the push to keep interest rates low (sold as a good thing for borrowers) does not help: wages and benefits etc are tied to the headline rate of inflation so borrowers do not benefit if this is left out.
ETA: The ONS confirms the point I am trying to make, I think. They report that up till 2004
QUOTE
The table shows that over the third of a century since 1970, prices overall rose ten times, with food prices rising more slowly, by a little over eight times. This compares with an 18-fold increase in average earnings and a 36-fold increase in house prices.
Over a more recent period, 1990 to 2004, it is a similar story, with overall inflation outstripping the change in food prices, and average earnings and average house prices rising faster still. Of the commodities listed, petrol and a pint of bitter rose roughly in line with the growth in average earnings, while only cigarettes exceeded the growth in average house prices.
