Sentiment among American consumers fell to a decade low in late January, with Michigan University’s monthly confidence survey blaming the decline on pandemic fears and worries about high inflation. The University of Michigan’s Consumer Sentiment index fell to a reading of 67.2 in January from 70.6 in December, pushing the gauge to its lowest reading since November 2011. “The Delta and Omicron variants were largely responsible, but other factors, some of which were initially triggered by COVID, have become independent forces shaping sentiment,” Richard Curtin, the survey director, said in a statement. Curtin noted growing evidence of an emergent wage-price spiral that has become disconnected from initial conditions that sparked the current bout of inflation, namely supply chain dislocations and the labor crunch. A number of economists have warned of a looming wage-price spiral, a kind of negative feedback loop where inflation expectations become more entrenched, prompting workers to demand …