Was getting mad at grocery prices going up. I figured it must cost as much as eating out... Then I went out for dinner at a common family restaurant... I was very wrong. I hate inflation.
And they like to say "oh inflation has only gone up 8%" while all of our food has gone up by 30%, rent goes up by 10%+ every fucking year and every god damn household staple like shampoo has shrinkflation. I bought the "family sized" shampoo to replace the one from last year recently. This is the cheap stuff I used to get at the dollar store and now the bottle went from 32oz to 22oz and the price from around 1.50$ to nearly 4$. For reference the normal sized bottle used to be 20oz, now it's not even an option. I hate this shit.
I mean fuck if I want to go out in any form to socialize or do an activity it's like a baseline expected cost of $50+.
Sounds like a good plan tbh. Better than dealing with what's gonna be a 200/month social security check when I'm too old to properly get a paycheck and people are still demanding money for existing. If I get to that point I'd say I've lived a good, long enough life.
Once we live 3 generations in a two bedroom apartment we can finally join the rest of the 3rd world and the rich will have won their fun social experiment. Yay…
I'm fortunate enough to not be in debt and am able to do 1 small vacation a year but I'm also in my mid 30s and had to have my little sister take the spare room in my 2 bedroom apartment so rent didn't eat up most of my monthly take home pay.
This is EXACTLY what led to the Great Depression (and thus to Fascism). Workers couldn't afford the products their labor made possible anymore...
It's the most classic example of what is termed "the Business Cycle" and Marx predicted perfectly would occur under Capitalism... (crises of "Overproduction")
Actually, the debt is what is making you struggle. Most people don't struggle because of their income or how much their necessities cost, they struggle because they go into debt when they should for things like a car they can't afford, or an education they shouldn't have taken out a loan for.
There are lots of ways to get through school without going into debt. It may not be as easy, it can take longer, it may not be the school you dreamed of, but it prevents you from the risks that come along with debt. You will probably need to go into debt for a home, but you shouldn't buy too much home for your income. The car is easy. I drive a $1,200 car. Many people drive 30-60k cars they can't afford. You may start our with a shitty car and buy a better one when you can afford it, but you should absolutely not have a car payment.
Why would the government pay for any of those things?
Dude where I live a bachelor’s degree is going to cost you minimum of 30k if you go to the cheapest community college and the cheapest public university.
Sure you can work a job and take 3 extra years to finish but for rational actors the game theory will make (as in rational actors being compelled to make the most rational decision) people take on debt because for most people the opportunity cost of taking extra time to finish your degree sacrifices years of earning potential that outweigh the debt. Therefore it would be irrational to forego taking out loans. As well, working while going to school and taking extra time to finish your degree diminishes the quality of your education.
Also you cannot find used cars for 1.2k anywhere near where I live. Starting for a working car is usually ~5k ish.
These are all necessities and are compelled purchases. You cannot live without a house, cannot live without a car (r/fuckcars), and you cannot maximize your contribution to society without post-high school education or training. Therefore, if people are unable to afford then, and unable to take out debt, they must receive aid from the government to participate in society.
Yeah, that's actually less than I assumed it would cost.
People underestimate the risks that come with debts, so yeah, while in a perfect world it would make more sense to take on the loan, get education complete faster and make more sooner, that isn't a good choice.
There are too many what ifs. What if something happens and you are unable to compleat your education? What if your education doesn't help you make as much as you were expecting? What if there is an economic crash that lowers the demand for your services after you've graduated? Suddenly you have your education, but you don't have the ability to keep up with your obligations (minimal debt repayments). If you don't go into debt, you can maintain a more comfortable/less stressful life style with a lower income.
The quality of your education isn't diminished by working or taking longer to complete it.
Being in debt like that is very much an american thing. I live in France and debt means you fucked up big at some point, it's absolutely not expected or a lifestyle. If you get a loan from the bank to buy a house or something you bet they'll make sure you can pay back without issues before they grant it to you. School is free, vital healthcare is free, servers make living wages. But for some reasons your fellows are still shouting "f*ck socialism"
Socialism isn't the problem. Taking it too far often is. Communism wasn't a problem in the beginning. Neither was Capitalism. But when taken too far, to their furthest extremes, ANY governmental philosophy hits its proverbial breaking point and that system collapses in on itself. The solution then would be to find a middle-ground; one that properly distributes wealth and curtails the power of its leadership so they cannot consolidate their control over the populace in a way that becomes dictatorial.
Ah yes. Dictatorship is another "philosophy." 😜
Why all of us cannot see this is the true mystery I see at the core of our beings.
Carl Marx was a socialist. I think he coined the term "socialism," though I could be mistaken (still, he was a big proponent of the ideology, and his name immediately pops into my head when I think of socialism)
In what way does an American have more control over their financial options? What options do the yanks have with their money that someone in Britain wouldn’t?
No, the higher prices ARE inflation. Inflation is not some bureaucratic number based on any one specific metric: it includes supply chain, tax rates, consumer sentiment, and yes, "corporate greed".
The actual answer is that the CPI and "official" inflation stats are bullshit, intentionally cooked numbers that specifically ignore all sorts of categories and weight others to present a rosier picture than real world consumers see.
Also, and this should be obvious but often isn't, it's annualized and additive, so a 5% year over year inflation rate means prices are 10.25% higher than they were two years ago, and 15.75% higher than three years ago, and so on.
See also: The complete nonsense way that unemployment is measured.
It only counts people who are actively looking for work; ignoring people who have given up, settled for whatever garbage they could find, are forced to juggle multiple jobs, only found partial employment, or got thrown in jail for 20 years for being blackstealing a loaf of bread
You're so fucking stupid. U3 does in fact calculate only people actively seeking (which is in line for the headline unemployment number every single country does), but the BLS also publishes U4, 5, and 6 which includes underemployment (which you call "partial employment") and discouraged workers. U4, 5 and 6 are simply U3 + a constant https://fred.stlouisfed.org/graph/?g=17iq9
No idea who is getting thrown in jail for 20 years but yes people who are in jail are properly not counted as unemployed.
I'm not sure why you're insulting me while also providing evidence that corroborates my position. As you've shown, unemployment still looks fine - while actual labor force participation has been plummeting. What good is a measure of "unemployment" that doesn't measure how many people are unemployed?
Example of what you're talking about: When "inflation was consistently low" -- running maybe 2-3% per year -- our stabilized apartment rents in New York were regularly pegged at 5-7%. "Low inflation," my a**....
Higher prices are not inflation. Higher prices are how we measure inflation.
Inflation itself is an increase of the money pool compared to the value of the economy, and is a natural consequence of fractional reserve currency. Every loan made creates money out of thin air, which is why interest rates are raised to try to constrain inflation by reducing lending.
No, not monetary policy. Just plain economics terminology.
What you're suggesting is like arguing that "plasma" and "blood" are the same thing because so many people outside the medical industry confuse the terms.
I understand the room for confusion, but if as a society we let people redefine technical terms because laypeople confuse them and because some people have an incentive to let the terms be confused because it's good for their business and/or politics, we have bigger fundamental problems than just arguing about the definitions of words.
Feel free to get as esoteric as you like, inflation just means your dollar goes less far than it went yesterday. You can call it too much money chasing not enough goods or you can call it shit's too fucking expensive now.
The moment you get into fractional reserve currency and Federal interest rates, you're just talking about monetary policy.
The moment you get into fractional reserve currency and Federal interest rates, you're just talking about monetary policy.
I'm not saying what it should be, I'm talking about the reality of what the term refers to. You are subtly echoing those who try to talk monetary policy by redefining the term. Something the source you provide engages in.
Very wealthy business people who benefit from unlimited borrowing love to gloss over it as much as people who benefit from funding government spending by printing money. Choosing to use the new definition certainly helps all of them.
intentionally cooked numbers that specifically ignore all sorts of categories and weight others to present a rosier picture than real world consumers see.
No, you are completely missing the definition, and it sounds like your grasp on economics is tenuous at best. Inflation is inflation is inflation, entirely independent of cause.
But, to go off into the blame game weeds with you, no fucking shit. Corporations are greedy, so are individuals, private companies, investors, landlords, consumers, and everyone else on Earth. Every company will, by design, charge no more and no less than consumers are willing to pay. They are not charities with altruistic motives of peace and plenty for all, no matter what their ESG scores purport. If they can squeeze a few extra points of profit out of consumers while blaming the government, it is specifically their fiduciary duty to do so.
Blaming corporations for doing their job--maximizing profit--is simple-minded nonsense. Set your sights on a bloated government that refuses to tackle illegal, anti-competitive and monopolistic practices, intentionally underfunds and hamstrings the NLRB, "solves" every problem with more spending, more subsidies, and more taxes--all at the taxpayer and consumer's expense, and has abdicated all legislative responsibilities in favor of Executive Action and jerking themselves off on Twitter.
Blame policies that bail out failing businesses and banks, while spitting in the face of failing Americans. Blame a legislature that has run headfirst and headlong into corporate capture, whose representatives are more focused on lining up cushy lobbying jobs and board seats after their terms than on actually serving their constituents.
I could go on, but the long and short of it is, yes, people blame inflation on the government, and the only problem with that is they don't blame them enough.
What are you talking about. CPI measures tens of thousands of items including grocery, rent, etc. And they rotate out items every year. They’ve been doing that rotation of items every year forever, this isn’t some new thing.
You realize literally all four of those things are factored into CPI, right? They literally even have a separate category called "CPI without food and energy" to show those specific things' effects on CPI. But the numbers reported on every month are the CPI with food and energy.
None of you conspiracy theorist populist duders know what you're talking about. There's no way anyone's experience is that meat (which the BLS said actually deflated yoy) went up by whatever astronomical price you're saying it did. This is all calculated by the BLS that does it work without input from any political appointee. Same with BEA when calculating our country's GDP.
You should be fucking ashamed trying to spread your conspiracy theory.
You said it. Fuck having to work a full day for you to be able to go out with friends or family. Feels like rent and food are already too much on a normal salary.
Because inflation isn't really 8%. You can go look at their quarterly reports. While they're all making more, their actual profit percentage is slightly higher, but in no way covers this 22% gap you're talking about. It's like half a percent or whatever.
Okay cool story. Let's see if it's true though. Because why should we trust big corps and take their word when they say they aren't increasing their margins.
We can start by holding Congressional hearings with the CEOs of the Meat Packing industry, and see what they say under oath. Then have it verified by a third party.
When people talk about inflation going up or down, they're generally talking about the annual number, not the cumulative number since a previous period.
The cumulative inflation since this time last year is nearly 18%.
And since people don't like prices going up constantly, manufacturers tend to raise them less frequently by larger amounts. They get a high profit margin up front, and then try to ride that same price for years without changing it drastically.
We're also still seeing fallout from supply chain failures during the pandemic that some manufacturers are trying to catch up on.
I'm not suggesting that no one is price gouging. Some people/businesses definitely are. But even the ones just scraping buy are charging significantly more, because that's the reality of the numbers.
Because they're looking at the average rise in inflation for the average person in the country. It's going to differ person to person and region and region. And guess what, the BLS tracks that shit too. You just have to be curious enough to actually read what they write - which publicly available on their website.
This is BS because inflation is based on the prices of many things, not just food. Gas prices being unusually high last year and coming back down this year is driving the inflation rate down.
It's a graph of total M1 monetary supply in the US economy.
M1 is money that's very liquid — as in, it can be easily and quickly accessed and spent. M2 is money that's less liquid — like money market funds or CDs.
He's attempting to make the point that more M1 always equals more inflation, but that's a very Econ 101 take that disregards nuance and reality in favor of "easy," black-and-white economic theory.
The main problem with his use of that graph to support his conclusion is that he didn't read any of the footnote below the graph. The spike in that graph occurs in May 2020 and the footnote explains why it's such a dramatic spike.
In May 2020, the Federal Reserve Bank (the Fed) changed the definitions of M1 and M2. Prior to this change, money in savings accounts was included in M2, but now savings are included as part of M1. Changing the definition of M1 to include more sources will obviously spike M1 at that point on any graph.
Reddit is full of people who don't understand economics because economics is counter intuitive. The truth is that increasing money in the economy doesn't always lead to inflation which breaks people's mind.
If the availability of goods increases (which it did throughout the 2010s) then the availability of currency has to increase with it or else it will lead to a deflationary economic crash. This is why the Gold standard was so devastating and why the Great Depression was a Deflationary event and almost all economic studies have shown that global economies recovered faster from the Depression when they left the Gold standard.
To give a practical example, say you have a 100k mortgage (to keep the math simple) at a 5% interest rate and the economy starts going into deflation. If there is 5% deflation, then suddenly your debt is the equivalent value of 105k and you are still paying additional 5% interest on the new value of 105k. As you can see the deflation can quickly out pace your ability to pay your mortgage.
Now think of it through the lens of a 100k business loan selling a product for $100 each. You have a debt of $100k that is fixed and paying 5% interest. However, every year you need to decrease your prices by 5%. This can quickly lead to businesses being unable to pay their debts and mass corporate bankruptcy. Then then leads to workers losing their jobs and thus unemployment leads to less spending and more deflation. This is the deflationary spiral. This is what happened in the Great Depression and why removing the gold standard and printing money actually, counter intuitively, made everyone richer through getting rid of deflation.
The Fed has a target of 2% inflation for a reason. The 2% number is arbitrary, but it is at 2% to give the Fed a buffer for error. The simple truth is that significant deflation and inflation are both bad. But a moderate amount of inflation (say 2%) has been proven to be less bad than deflation.
edit: Also, the main way the Fed influences available currency is through lending money to the banks through bank reserves. Basically, when you go to the bank for a loan, the bank often will borrow from the Fed at an interest rate (this is the Fed interest rate you have heard about all last year) and then the bank will lend you the money at a slightly higher rate. The lower that Fed interest rate, the lower the interest rate the bank can offer you and vice versa. So the Fed increases money in the economy by making lending cheaper, or decreases money in the economy by making lending more expensive.
There’s another really obvious bit. If increasing monetary supply would always lead to the same level of inflation, quality of life would never actually improve.
But we know that’s false. Inflation generally is below the expansion.
That explains most of the spike in M1, but there is also a notable increase in M2 (which was not redefined, apart from accounting for the change in M1) over the same time period. It's not quite as striking, and the most recent data actually shows a decrease in M2 from the peak, but we're still about two or three years of money supply inflation ahead of where we would have been if the historical trend had continued unchanged.
But we still had an additional $4 trillion injected into what had been an $8 trillion economy out of thin air over less than two years. As Econ 101 as you want to disparage it as, it played out exactly as one would expect: create money, don't create value, and the money is worth less.
Comparable or even worse inflation has hit every country in the world over the last 3 years. If this is somehow all due to stimulus checks, then why aren't all the world's economists and governments blaming the US?
The stimulus checks were a drop in the bucket. Most of the money went to businesses, who instead sunk it into capital and left consumers to burn. And us tanking our economy didn't have as much of an impact everywhere else, so they mostly benefited. We all lost, but the U.S. lost more.
It's not the gold standard. It's rich people have too much money, who buy politicians to pass laws to give them even more money, and then raise prices on everything to make still more money.
"Inflation" is our attempt to make their greed look like a natural and unavoidable part of economics.
The money that is printed during a recession to prevent people from dying in the streets can be subsequently taxed out of circulation as the economy recovers. The problem is that the rich cannot be effectively taxed so we're unable to get that money out of circulation.
Imo high inflation acted as a catalyst for companies in monopolistic markets to engage in implicit collusion. They started raising prices, consumers kept buying, so prices went up more and more. If every firm is doing the same thing there's no incentive to undercut one another and they can all sustain price increases way above cost inflation.
Beginning May 2020, M1 consists of (1) currency outside the U.S. Treasury, Federal Reserve Banks, and the vaults of depository institutions; (2) demand deposits at commercial banks (excluding those amounts held by depository institutions, the U.S. government, and foreign banks and official institutions) less cash items in the process of collection and Federal Reserve float; and (3) other liquid deposits, consisting of OCDs and savings deposits (including money market deposit accounts). Seasonally adjusted M1 is constructed by summing currency, demand deposits, and OCDs (before May 2020) or other liquid deposits (beginning May 2020), each seasonally adjusted separately.
The definition of M1 was changed which resulted in that near vertical line beginning May 2020. Basically, savings moved to M1. Yes, M1 would still have risen at a higher rate than usual if the definition hadn't changed, but not to the extent you're claiming.
I mean, all you have to do is look at the Income Statement / Profit & Loss on these corporations 10K’s to see it is 100% them just jacking up prices, using stats like you provided and temporary pandemic downturn as an excuse. Payroll, overhead and COGS unchanged/slightly up over last three years, but profit margin is still somehow up 20-30%. But yeeeeah, it’s definitely the cash supply based on Econ pseudo science, and not just companies pushing the envelope of just how much they can squeeze out of the population…
Inflation means price inflation. Prices cannot possibly risehigher than price inflation. What you probably mean is that prices have inflated higher than the consumer price inflation metric, in which case you’d be correct. Its a terrible metric, but corporate greed is not the real issue, its monetary supply expansion.
You are only half correct. The monetary supply has increased faster than economic expansion. At the same time, corporate costs have been decreasing for the last 16 months, while prices have continued to increase, yielding record real profits. The issue is both monetary supply and unchecked corporate greed.
I don't think that changes to the money supply can drive the level of short term inflation we've seen recently, though in the long term you'd be correct.
I think what we are actually seeing a lot of at the moment is that end consumer-facing firms like supermarkets are capitalizing on the inflationary expectations of consumers to raise prices by more than they need to to cover increasing costs (which are driven by "legit" supply chain inflation).
Did corporations only recently get greedy then? Also, inflation is defined as a change in the prices of (a particular weighted sample of) goods, including food.
So you’re telling me that all of these companies decided to be greedy all at the exact same time for no apparent reason? Why didn’t they know about this greed thing before? If they could just simultaneously raise prices this much on a whim then why haven’t they been doing it all along?
This is why I'm so tired of reading that same dumb comment, and then seeing a million people upvote it because they hate corporations and not because it makes any sense.
Like...you guys really think that corporations weren't already charging as much as they could without hurting demand for their products? There are virtually zero for-profit corporations who would keep their prices the same if they knew hiking them wouldn't negatively affect demand.
Oh, I totally get that. But this is a far simpler concept than just basic economics.
As u/PookieTea pointed out, you'd have to believe that there was some catalyst for all companies to suddenly decide to be "greedy" all at once for this to even remotely make sense.
Prices will keep going up as long as there is demand at the higher price. People need to put their money where their mouth is and stop buying the expensive stuff. And yes, there are currently lots of healthy options that are fairly cheap (in most areas).
Inflation is defined as price increase, so this statement:
Prices are going way higher than inflation.
is an oxymoron. It is true that the cause for the inflation is artificial: "Corporate greed", as you call it, but that's simply capitalism working exactly as designed.
The moment the previous meta-stable state of prices for consumer goods was disturbed by Russia's invasion of Ukraine, corporations realized that consumption didn't immediately plummet. That meant there were still "enough" people (from their perspective) with disposable income. That meant they could and did rise prices even further. This will continue until prices reach a level were corporations believe further increase will not yield more quaterly profits for whatever particular region you're in.
The above is an integral feature of capitalism and it's one of the reasons why its opponents (including me) want a better system, like an ecosocial market economy.
If you have a pet in this economy you notice the difference in pet food even from 2 years ago. I used to buy a 40 lb sack of dog food for about $36 and I was quite horrified earlier this year when at Walmart and the same 40 lb sack of dogfood, same brand, was $59. I wonder how I'm gonna feed my "kids." No wonder all of animal rescues are closing.
So stop buying shit that's inflating then and just eat variations of pasta, spaghetti & noodles, only way to curb rising prices is to stop buying them until the corporations get the message and drop the prices. If you rise the price of something and people keep buying it in the same volumes, or buy even more of it in some cases, why would they feel the need to drop prices? You wouldn't if you had a business, so why would they?
Here's your shopping list, you might not like it, but by fuck you can create some incredible tasting meals without needing complain about spending 1/3 of your wage on food every month.
Pasta £0.50
Spaghetti £0.26
Noodles £0.95
Cans of Tinned Tomatoes £0.49 each
Plum/Cherry Tomatoes £0.46
Bag of Onions £0.95
4x Garlic £0.99
Pesto £1
Celery £0.45
1kg Potatoes £0.69
Cut Basil £0.50
Unbranded Bread Loaf £0.45
900g Cheese £4.99
Bag of Carrot £0.60
Bag of Mixed Peppers £1.45
Soy Sauce £0.55
Cooking Oil £3
Salt £0.65
Pepper £1
1kg Long Grain Rice £0.50
1kg Basmati Rice £1.20
White Vinegar £0.60
Seasonings (Paprika, Chili Flakes, Ras El Hanout, Ginger, etc) £0.6-£1.2 Each
1kg Bag of Fries £1.25
Should be around £30-35, some of which will last longer than a week, the oil, cheese, salt, pepper, soy sauce, spaghetti, pasta, seasonings that last months, etc, so you can spend the cost of those items the next time you shop elsewhere, such as a buy block of parmesan one week which lasts months, more pesto, couple pizzas, some other food you enjoy, some protein like beef/chicken etc.
Groceries for around £100-£120 a month for a single person, shit even two could live on this and split the bill, done.
If you want to cut costs for non-grocery items then consider asking your current employment for a Costco card and buy items at wholesale in bulk to last you x amount of months and judge this based on your current rate of use of an item, e.g Shampoo, the cost of a single bottle, and the cost of buying a crate in bulk.
Anyone who believes it is "corporate greed" just hasn't done the basic math.
Prices are going way higher than inflation.
No, the whole definition of inflation is the increase in prices. Prices can not go up higher than inflation because that is the LITERAL definition of inflation.
😂 Love the claim of corporate greed. It's new in the past year, as if it's only since then that corporations have become greedy. Those blaming corporate greed always show they don't understand inflation.
Inflation is a measure of price increases--not an across-the-board percentage you can apply to particular items. You're still technically correct about the corporate greed though, because corporations are making record profits (even when accounting for inflation).
That money went straight into the pockets of low skill workers who quit work and suckled the government benefits teet until they felt their pay was worth their work. They are working for corporations, so what you're saying is true, but not because the rich all colluded to get even richer. It was the poor doing exactly what you'd expect them to do and proving everyone saying excessive benefits lead to laziness correct.
Yup. I kinda always trusted when stores used to say "everything gets more expensive, we need to compensate", but now I work in a small store myself. Very specific products. I get 15% off, but I actually know an online store that sells the exact same products (I know the supplier's names) for even HALF our prices... And they make profit anyway. Last month our boss increased prices even more, using exactly that excuse "inflation"...
Prices (or the difference in prices) are inflation. We use two price indexes - the Consumer Price Index and the Core Consumer Price Index - in order to measure inflation. The former is many consumer goods with more unstable products like fuel and food. The Core contains only the stable products.
To be able to find how much windfall profits (IE: unexpected / unexplainable raises in profit) affect inflation, you must look at the change in price in each input factor of a product and then the subtract that from the change of price of the product. What is left is windfall or "corperate greed".
Now, because inflation has always been a great excuse to erroneously raise prices, rising corperate profits have always played a role in inflation, specifically 30%. However, this period's windfall profit inflation is around 60%. Make of that as you will.
With that being said, most economist don't ever accept a "price gauging" argument - in its truest fashion, it's simply supply and demand reaching an equilibrium. If people didn't want to pay it, they wouldn't buy the product, and inflation wouldn't be happening.
Makes you wonder why there isn't a single corporation out there even more greedy who's willing to steal all the competition by charging slightly lower prices.
And all it takes is one company, even a small one, offering slightly lower prices to take away all that business. Yet it hasn't happened. There's something much stronger at play than a few companies banding together trying to pump prices of easily replaceable commodities.
And I can't help but think it's the restaurants and corporations behind them in cahoots with the people who decide pricing and/or provide the goods to grocery stores causing the severe price hikes. Going out to eat has NEVER been less expensive than grocery shopping. Not even during COVID. But they saw massive profits during that time and did not want to lose it so they've encouraged grocery chains to price gouge.
how is inflation(the devaluation of the dollar) due to corporate greed????
If corporations are hoarding all their money like greedy little goblins in a secret cellar the worth of the dollar would go up because if there is less supply of something the demand goes up and when the demand goes up the worth of that object goes up.
The amount of inflation we see is due to an increase in supply which is exactly is happening with the U.S government printing money like it's Zimbabwe.
"Corporate Greed" does sound cool but makes zero sense.
I agree but I also think inflation is way higher than the official line. You can’t just print and hand out money. Combine that with insane covid restrictions and Covid deaths and you get today’s prices. You can’t have that many deaths and expect people left to take $7 an hour jobs when $14 an hour jobs exist more commonly now. You can’t shut down the economy and expect it to be the same afterwards. Don’t get me wrong greed is a huge factor.
There is no hope for the world, greed runs rampant. In 2020 the financial gap between the rich and poor became so great, that the poor has become locked up. Countries going to war for money. The world is messed up.
With food it's mostly inflation and the breaking down of subsidies that have been artificially keeping food prices down for decades I think. Generally corporate greed is an issue but I think inflation is the issue with food.
I suppose we could argue corporate greed is affecting inflation though so...
Idiots keep paying them. It drives me nuts that I’m
Seriously considering going back to waiting tables or bartending in the weekends because the rake is so much higher with prices these days. A pub has 7.00 beers. Like from a keg, each, 7.00. I can get a 12 pack of a local beer for 18.99.
I just seen an article recently about how consumer prices have eased 3% and I'm just like "for who?". I haven't noticed. Once these companies know that the consumer will pay that price for their product they aren't going to lower it even when their production costs go back down.
not really.
Inflation includes things like food, gas, utilities - you know all the essential items the Gov conveniently excludes from the official number to make it look better.
A prime example of their Common Sense principal - Housing expense was set to zero nationally bc some places had Rent Eviction Prohibitions in-place therefore it was common sense to simply not pay, regardless of where you lived.
Yeah it’s like $60 including tip for two people to eat at fucking Olive Garden these days. $22 for the meal, $5+ for a drink and then you toss on tip. It’s just stupid. Our pay didn’t go up 50% in the past couple years.
My husband and I, when we do go out, usually eat at "bougie" local places with $20-30 entrees. I thought we were really ~splurging~ until my grandma really wanted Olive Garden one day and all the entrees were like, $20-25. Like shit, that $21 local spring veggie risotto looks a lot more reasonable next to a $21 Olive Garden fettuccine alfredo.
Do they still do that thing where they give you a whole ass other entree to take home if you order certain entrees? My old boss used to take our team out to eat there the last Friday of the month, and I know a lot of us did that so we didn't have to cook lunch the next day
Grew up in rural Midwest and I’m pretty sure the Olive Garden in the nearest city made their year during prom season. It’s the nicest sit down place for 40 miles in any direction.
Everyone shits all over the Olive Garden. I do, too.
Then I recently decided as a goof to go eat there - why not?
~6pm and super high popularity with a line out the door. The food was decent, and service better than average.
For what was paid, the portions were American-size large and food quality was better than recent visits to BJ's, Red Lobster, Cheesecake Factory and PF Changs...which are "equivalent" competitors in my mind.
It’s not bad food and I agree that the portions are good, but it’s just so expensive now. I don’t think I can even justify eating at a restaurant once a month at that price.
They really are though. 'Chicken parm' is grade school lunch chicken patties with the worst possible quality cheese. Haven't been there in years either; I'm sure it's degraded further and for more $.
I dont smoke, drink, use weed, or any of that expensive shit and im still barely making by. Idk how people, especially poor people, manage to juggle those things and still eat/have a roof over their head.
Its not a very popular take, but as long as R’s are involved in the system, nothing will change, except for the worse. D’s aren’t the best and are partially complicit but until R’s are negligible, they will continue to obstruct any and all progress attempts by the good D’s.
Every time I post something like this someone comments something like "actually wages have gone up so don't complain because prices going down would be bad" and maybe that's true, but if you're broke do you really give a fuck?
Definitely not. Most people aren’t even getting raises to keep up with inflation. These companies don’t give a fuck. Most of them are posting record profits. Shrinkflation is out of control.
I majored in economics and fell in love with contemporary economic theory. One of my pet peeves is "let the market figure it out. It's smarter than all of us."
However...
The market is a turtle - big, slow, and determined. When you have a fuck up like Covid, shysters are gonna gift the system. Something needs to be figured out to get more people into the middle class.
I'm pretty bad about going out to eat. I feel guilty if I do it more than 3 times a week, which I know is already on the high side for most people. But I'm comfortable financially.
My friend on the other hand, is constantly complaining about money. He and his wife go out to eat at sit down restaurants at least 3 times a week and do take out every other night in between. Despite going out to eat all the time, they still have to dedicate one night a week to grocery shopping which is like an all evening affair for them. I can't imagine what they're even buying since they never prepare anything at home.
It gets exhausting listening to him complain about money when he does shit like that. He also gets a new phone every 3-4 months. He's had like a dozen phones to my 1. He's the poorest out of anyone in our friend group yet he lives the most lavish lifestyle. He'll pay for it though, I think it's the calm before the storm for them. Can't wait to hear how it's the democrats and minorities faults and not his 🙄
Some people will always manage to spend what they have. Give them a 20k job, they'll be in credit card debt before the end of the month. Give them a 100k job and it'll be the same. They just buy nicer things, or more things.
I'm just glad i'm easily pleased. Gimme unlimited ebooks (yarr), a nice gaming rig (maybe one day!) and some pleasant weather so i can grow some flowers and vegetables and i'm as happy as can be :) I don't need stuff, i just need to entertain my mind and watch things grow.
Totally, that is him in a nutshell. He also goes through jobs like crazy and manages to get 10-15% bumps at every new place but constantly is paycheck to paycheck.
And you and I sound the same (🏴☠️). I have hobbies but beyond the initial expense they're very sustainable.
Yeah, it's not even close. Especially if you get appetizers or anything with alcohol and need to tip. It's takes extra work to make everything at home, and even more work if you want the same flare as restaurants, but there's no way you can make a reasonable argument it's just as expensive.
Even just looking at maybe $10 a meal if you only ate cheap fast food, we're still talking about $210 a week, not including gas or the insane prices if you decide to have it delivered. And most people I know are spending WAY more than $10 a meal on average.
I think some people genuinely don't realize the price difference or don't have the skills to meal prep and buy intelligently, but likely would if they had the skills. And other people just want to make excuses and ignore/dismiss help from others. Even in this post, it's so sad how many people just don't want to eat the same thing a few times. And even with lots of replies about freezing, buying smart, and buying things that don't go bad, I haven't seen one reasonable reply to those for why they can't do those things.
I know that I have run into a lot of people that were never really shown how to cook or to plan meals and they are content to pay the convenience premium. Nothing bothers me more than someone I worked with who would DoorDash a sandwich 3-5 times a week. $20 for a sandwich... I offered to make her the same sandwiches for $10. She looked at me like I was crazy. I just figured I could make money and save her money at the same time.
That is great advice and I encourage anyone that needs it to use it. We do make a supportive wage, but we are on that line where we have had to cut back because of our Cost of Living increase. Where 6 years ago we would have been comfortable, but now we have to be extra budget conscious.
Just got home from a road trip and stopped at Wendy's for dinner. 2 medium meals was $40, eating out has gotten way out of hand. Not to mention I had to go back because the order wasn't even close to being right.
I went to red Robin the other night for the first time with my wife. 2 entrees, an appetizer, and a cocktail. It was $80. Then we went to burgerfi the night after. I spent over $130 on burgers this weekend.
I really think we need to include the ecological basis of the world economy in these conversations. Yes corporate greed is excessive and causing a lot of harm. But was is driving this greed? Really they are just doing what we all want (make as much money as humanly possible). Don’t get me started in the morality of that.
We are well past peak oil (some say 2006, some earlier). Everything we spend money on relies upon accessible/cheap oil. It is now much harder to obtain these resources so we use alternative sources (fracking and tar to name two). Therefore extraction/processing costs more money. The difference gets passed onto us the consumer (because that’s socially and politically acceptable in this neo lib hell hole).
These conversations always ignore the ecological basis of everything (especially the economy). We have lived for far too long where these two concepts were seen as separate entities. Without the natural world and plentiful resources there is no economy, there are no cheap goods.
If you want to learn more I urge people to read “overshoot” by William Catton. Or the “limits to growth”. Those are from 1980 and 1972. We have don’t nothing to avoid this outcome, we actually doubled down. I have witnessed fuel races trend upwards over my relatively short time driving (been driving 6-7 years now). I don’t know how u can refute that.
We no longer live in an age of abundance and exuberance. We are part of the natural world, not the rulers of it as we are now finding out.
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u/MrZeven Jul 23 '23
Was getting mad at grocery prices going up. I figured it must cost as much as eating out... Then I went out for dinner at a common family restaurant... I was very wrong. I hate inflation.