I’m tired of people who complain about the price of everything….
$15.00 for parking.
$5.00 for coat check.
$34.95 for a basic pasta and chicken entrée.
$3.95 for coffee.
I’m just going to stop inviting them to our house.
Separately, today’s the day for the December 2022 inflation report from the BLS (actually deflation compared to November! Down at a 1.2% rate, but up 6.5% compared to a year earlier). We can see whether Kwanzaa shopping and travel overpowered the deflationary effect of weather that kept people as locked in as a K-12 student in a Democrat-governed city during 18 months of coronascience. What’s the correct level of panic regarding inflation and the recent escalation in deficit spending by Congress?
Anecdotes: the local Abacoa (Jupiter, Florida) barber shop is charging $30 to cut the hair of anyone identifying as a “man”, up from $20 in 2019. I paid $30 each for pizzas to feed some MIT students. At most, each was sufficient for 4 students.
One thing that is going up by 5 percent in 10 days… a USPS stamp. They didn’t get the memo that inflation had been whipped by muscular action in Washington, D.C.? Certainly it will be worth paying 63 cents to mail a letter and celebrate the Year of the Rabbit (starts on the same day as the price increase) simultaneously:
It is a water year coming up so according to Chinese mythology, the correct depiction would be of a black rabbit.
I bought 300 Forever stamps for $100 a few years ago. It was a bit of an initial investment but I feel smarter every Christmas card sending season
Markets like the Euro again (1.09 USD), even though ECB interest rates are just 2.5% and inflation is 10%.
They must know something I don’t (perhaps I should just buy “forever” stamps as a store of value; Bitcoin didn’t work out too well …).
The bullshit labor statistics department is working overtime. The mane problem as regards stonks is how far the fed balance sheet is going to be reduced. That will continue directly lowering stonks even after interest rates go back to 0.
$15 for parking – do you live in 1996? Even here in remote CYYC its $30+ parking downtown.
Funny.
Though if you think about it regardless of the cost of a stamp the amount most of us spend on postage stamps is trivial since who uses them anymore? Uncle could double or triple the price of a postage stamp and I would still probably spend (a lot) less annually on postage than I did 10 years ago. Anytime I have had the misfortune of going to the post office over the last few years the place is deserted. I think the post office primarily exists these days for people who haven’t yet figured out the internet and bulk mailers.
“I think the post office primarily exists these days for people who haven’t yet figured out the internet and bulk mailers.”
And to provide jobs for black female high school grads.
The USPS has been heavily recruiting for over a year.
Bulk mail has risen by a similar amount although the exact percentage depends to a certain extent on the postal sort breakdown where presorted bulk mail is concerned. That’s a topic beyond the scope of this discussion, and one which I’m sure would bring everyone to tears to an even greater extent than you’ve outraged your guests with your exorbitant home hospitality tariffs. How dare you! Lol. You’re a shameless “idle rich” food nosh profiteer!
BTW the increase in postage rates puts DOWNWARD pressure on me. I think this is the second one this year, I’ll have to double check. In any case, the first thing that happens is that my clients complain to me and moan and groan and ask for a discount. Which I am going to counterargue very effectively, with no small thanks to this blog. Everyone is looking for cost savings now and there are precious few to be found. Most of the meat has been scraped from the bone in that regard, particularly with the base inflation already pounding away at me all year long.
Is the food good? That’s all I want to know. I think those are reasonable prices to pay for an evening with our host. Others will surely differ.
You could lose money fast if you subbed Beluga caviar on Ritz crackers instead of the chicken dish. This brand was $5,700 per kilogram back in 2019.
Agroittica Lombarta Group:
https://youtu.be/XKqwBzQFRws
Surprisingly the price of this caviar has not gone up very much since 2019. It’s listed on the manufacturer’s website at 5900 Euros today, so it’s an inflation beater!