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No Inflation To See Here...
Submitted by Simon Black of Sovereign Man blog,
One of the biggest lies in finance is this perpetual deception that inflation is good.
Ben Bernanke, the current high priest of US monetary policy, recently remarked that it’s “important to prevent US inflation from falling too low.”
Well of course, we wouldn’t want that, would we? Just imagine the chaos and devastation that would ensue if the cost of living actually remained… you know… the same.
One shudders at the mere thought of price stability.
Of course I jest. Fact is, inflation benefits those who are in debt up to their eyeballs at the expense of people who have been financially responsible.
Yet economists have somehow managed to convince people that inflation is just and necessary. We all know inflation exists. But we’ve been programmed to shrug it off as if it’s a natural part of the system.
The even greater deceit is how they report the figures.
Governments all over the world lie about inflation; they do this because inflation has such a huge impact in monetary policy.
The playbook they all use is very simple– as long as inflation is ‘low’, then central bankers can print money. So they have a big incentive to underreport it.
Quoting a report from the US Department of Labor, for example, a recent headline from Reuters stated “U.S. consumer prices rise, but underlying inflation benign”.
I’m not entirely sure how inflation can be ‘benign’ while consumer prices are simultaneously rising.
Yet this is the modern day doublethink coming from the Ministry of Truth that we are all expected to unquestioningly believe.
Inflation does exist. I’ve seen it all over the world as I travel. In India right now, the reported inflation figure just hit 10% at a time when the economy is sagging.
In Bangladesh, workers are now rioting over rising cost of living, which far exceeds the proposed wage hikes that are on the table.
In the Land of the Free, the average price of a movie ticket is $8.38 earlier this year, another record high. Walnut farmers in California are now reaping record high prices on their crop.
And of course, McDonald’s is now killing their once popular dollar menu as they can no longer afford to sell anything at that price.
There are examples everywhere. And this also goes for asset price inflation.
We can see many stock and bond markets near their all-time highs. But then there are other asset classes… like farmland in Illinois, which is now selling for $13,600 per acre.
With an average yield of 160 bushels per acre, the net financial return after paying variable costs is less than 2%. It just doesn’t make any sense.
And in the art world, a Francis Bacon triptych just sold for a record $142 million at Christie’s in New York.
Everywhere you look, there’s overwhelming evidence of bubbles and price hikes. It’s simple. There’s too much money in the system.
Not only is this destructive, it’s the height of deceit to tell people that there’s no inflation.
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Nearly any man can withstand adversity. If you truly want to test a man's character, give him power. - Abraham Lincoln
With deflation bakns dont get paid back. People walk away from their mortgage when the price of their home falls below what they owe. With inflation banks get paid back in dollars that are worth less but at least they get paid back.
Governments hate deflation because its equivilent to a pay raise that they cant tax. If apples once cost $1 and now they cost $0.5 its the equivalent of doubling your income but no more money for uncle same.
Plus the whole inflate or die thing. Ponzi's need to grow or they blow up.
I don't mind the cost of living remaining the same, as a matter of fact I do all I can to balance the insanity of constantly rising prices.
i'm 47
i remember: 10 cent candy bars, 99 cent gallon of ice cream, 99 cent 2 lb box of potato chips, seeing 29.9 cent gas, 10 cent loaf of bread, and more for less
and just in the last ten years, gas well under a dollar a gallon, dollar gallon of milk, good bread for a dollar
inflation sucks, and mother fuckers who have enuf money not to be affected by it should not be the ones setting policy.
period
(who got to keep his health insurance)
The problem is, you are measuring the price of goods with things that have no value (USD's). OF COURSE the cost will increase as long as you insist on trading for them in paper notes with no real value...I'd say, you even got a deal. The .01%'s will say that you won the genetic lotto by being born and have been paying an 'artificial price' for decades.
We'll see how the winners of the 'genetic lotto' are doing when the USD reserve currency status ends
Zombies like eating fresh meat the best.
JohnQ, yeah god forbid there was defaltion and that money you saved 20 years ago was worth twice as much today. god forbid......
Prices stopped rising in Canada a while ago.
But my half a kilo of cheese is now 400 grams.
We're deflating the quantity.
No inflation here.
Lincoln was a classic demonstration of the truth of his own statement. He only killed about 700,000 Americans.
There's no difference between Lincoln and most any other president regarding preserving the union.
The only difference is that no uprising would ever be allowed to get to the point that it got to in the 1860's. It would be put down much earlier.
Ol' honest Abe is on my list of five worst Presidents the US ever had. You got 13 upvotes for quoting him. Tells me all I need to know when considering whether 'merica is fucked.
It's ironic that he clearly failed the test mentioned in the quotation. The first Republican; the first military dictator and tyrant; probably just a co-incidence.
C'mon SAT, you wanna go back and argue the Federalist, anti-Federalist, on throgh to the whigs? Shit. What about the Wobblies? Politics, and the "parties" are bullshit. I didn't downvote ya' tho.
Or maybe, some are able to look past the messenger, especially if he's dead.
The words are true no matter what you think of the person that said them.
Teddy Kennedy's dead now, too. I learned long ago to ignore words and pay attention to actions. Yeah, I know Jefferson died broke. He also fucked his slaves. You ever meet a white Jefferson? How 'bout a white Washington?
The point is, most of the people we're taught to look up to were frauds, in one way or another.
If there's a statue or a monument of them somewhere, you can bet it was the banksters, the number one enemy of the common man, who put it there.
Lincoln giving anyone advice about character is like Ike Turner giving advice about how a successful marriage works.
When it come to creating financial "products" of mass destruction from thin air, inflation does not matter as there are no real inputs.
For those of us that actually produce things of real value requiring real commodities as inputs, inflation is very real.
roll the motherfucking guillotines already.
You would think the media would be all for guillotines applied to the likes of the Bernank, no? Bullish!
Yellen, like Hillary, is being setup to fail.
Yes! Black Men and Women get a PASS!
It was a set up!
These bastards at the Fed are not even able to get inflation.
But the day it will kick in, it will be Weimar 2 (from 20% to 10'000% in less than a year).
Kinda tough to get inflation when you take food, energy, and housing out of the equation. Just sayin....
Lol. It's probably why the Big Mac Index is the most accurate IMO.
Electronics are the economists' best friends, since they constantly fall in price and offset everything they don't exclude. IMO, it's why the Billion Prices Project reflects about the same underlying rate as the official stats.
You'll never see economists exclude electronics in their calculations.
Current inflation rate is close to 10% yearly by 1980 standards of measurement.
http://www.shadowstats.com/alternate_data/inflation-charts
Agree.
Increase the amount of base currency = inflate supply
Increases currency devaluation through dilution
Result? Devalued currency induced cost/push inflation of prices.
ob1 - another way to measure the effect of inflation. how much was a base civic in 1989 and how much is it today.
Get worried when your house doubles again
What seems to happen with bubbles is that a central bank releases a lot of money that initially causes price increases mainly in financial assets. It doesn't cause much increase in the costs of ordinary goods because everyone is plowing their money into investments. This attracts more money into the financial sector and even more money is borrowed into existence as leverage increases. Eventually, the central bank realizes that things are getting out of control and tries to tighten. The crash often happens during the tightening.
Bernanke was making noises about tightening, but Yellen isn't going to tighten until it is obvious to everyone that things are out of control. As a consequence the crash has been delayed, possibly until 2015 or later. But when it happens, it will be a doozy.
Ben, I'm all good w/you, but it's duesy, taken from Duesenberg, a badass automobile in the 1930's. V-12 and shit badass. "she's a duesy"!
Is it really inflation or is it rationing by price?
Do people really think that cost push inflation now that globally we have been flat on the net BTU of liquids was not going to happen???
I discovered a new form of hiding food inflation last week. I bought a 500 gram container of olive oil spread, a type of margarine, and when I opened it, it looked a bit different for some reason this time, a bit dull looking, no shean to it like normal. It still smelled fine, and tasted the same though. I suspected it had partly melted and re-solidified in transport. I like to use it for cooking, so I'm pre-heating a pan, like always, prior to cooking some fish, and I spoon some of the spread into the hot pan, and it's not so much melting, as boiling and steaming!
I then realized why it had looked different, the manufacturer (Coles Supermarket Australia - product 500g "Lite Olive Oil Spread") had turned it into an emulsion, via mixing and whipping some unknown percentage of water into it. I noticed they also changed the packaging shape from this, but they retained the picture on it:
http://shop.coles.com.au/online/national/coles-spread-margarine-olive-oi...
So yeah, I purchased a 500 gram container, and it was full of spread, but some of that weight was now just water.
But food inflation is low - thanks Coles! (Whose moto is, "The Fresh Food People" ... should be "the fresh water people" ... with added salt ... of course)
And no, there's no massive entrenched non-competition problem implied in having a massive national monopoly of supermarket chains within virtually every Australian suburb. They would never act improperly, dishonestly or take advantage of their monopolistic power to short-change everyone.
Anyway, I guess it's back to using 'real' extra-virgin (real tight pussy this one) olive oil ... oh ... wait ... I forgot ... they water that down with vegetable oils too ...
Element,
Speaking as a tight pussy myself, please don't ever leave your extra virgin olive oil again ( reputably sourced, yes they are highly adulterated today). Any "spread" emulsion contain off lable contaminants. GRAS do not have to be specified. Fight back and stay safe! Never allow that garbage effect your sharp mind.
Miffed;-)
'adulterated' ... lol
re extra-virgin, I'm sure there's an interesting marketing anecdote behind that term. Have a great weekend in SOCAL.
Slightly OT, but you don't want to use EVOO for cooking. Plain OO has a higher smoke point. Save the EVOO for salads and the extra virgin for date night.
Coconut oil is healthiest!
Avocado oil which is not as well known is even healthier and is undervalued, has less saturated fat than coconut, has a very mild flavor and is easily swapted for all the uses of Olive oil.
The fact tht Olive Oyl is still virginal does not speak well of Popeye's powers of seduction.
Exactly. We need to also ask ourseves if rising home prices are good for us too. In most cases the answer is a resounding no. Rising home prices are not good for us. It does not make us wealthier, it makes us poorer.
http://knowmadiclife.com/blog/2013/6/25/are-rising-home-prices-good-for-us
Why should we ZHers care about inflation?
I have been thinking. Which is probably a big mistake. But here goes.
If the average sheeple is fooled into staying on the treadmill for nominal wage increases then it keeps the economy humming, demand up, and deflation at bay.
It is good for gold and good for us.
It is to our benefit that the sheeple stay on the treadmill and save in paper currencies. Their dilution is our gain. Right?
Fuck the sheeple. Can't do nothin' for them nohow.
I'm wit you bro. The question is do we want the sheeple to get fucked by inflation or deflation. Deflation will cause these Debt monkeys' balls to be tight in a vise forcing them to sell assets to the holders of Gold for pennies on the dollar to get out alive..
We'll be holding all the cards (and guns) then...
I think deflation would clobber gold as well, wouldn't it? Cash is the position for deflation. The you buy up the gold at deflated prices and wait for hyper inflation.
Fred
In calculating the consumer price index, the Bureau of Labor Statistics uses a rental housing proxy. One may have hoped that with an enormous surplus of empty housing, rents would go down, along with that component of the CPI. But no, banks have held houses off the markets and speculators have bought empty houses. Rents have stayed the same or risen.
With WS Firms buying up large % of the available houses, including those in the foreclosure process, I am sure that they will be putting them out there into the marketplace to rent at the lowest possible price for the betterment of humanity....
for the betterment of humanity? I read an Article about how the Chinese are buying up Detroit for cents on the dollar.
If the Chinese take their Detroit properties back home with them, then I say that's for the betterment of humanity. At least the humanity that lives in Michigan anyway.
I went to an Italian restaurant recently.
I haven't been there in a few months, but I got my usual stuff.
The menu changed (shudda been my first clue).
I got a lasagna. Same price but fully half the size of old.
I got a pizza. Used to cover the pizza board but now about 20% of board is exposed.
Fuck you Ben and any other cocksucker that tells me there is no inflation.
This is something I noticed also. Yesterday, I was at Sam's Club and bought one of their hot dog/soda combos. The price hasn't changed in at least 20 years or more - it's the same price at Costco also ($1.50). They really, really don't want to raise the price. So you know what they did - shrunk the dog by at least 50% over this time. I remember when it was so big you almost couldn't eat the whole thing in one sitting. You could eat half, save half for later. Now, it's barely bigger than the dogs you get out of an Oscar Meyer package. At Costco, I noticed the sign above the windows where you order now say "1/4 lb. PLUS" (no indication what the "plus" is, inferring that the dog weighs more than 1/4 lb., but could just as easily mean "plus bun"). That sign used to say "1/2 lb. All Beef Hot Dog". So it's safe to say the price has doubled, since the dog is half size now.
You can see examples of this everywhere, but this stands out in particular because the price has remained a constant for so many years.
Another egregious example of this is at Panda Express. Their take out box has shrunk by at least 30 - 40% in the past few years and the price has gone up by that much also. The smaller side dish box is practically the size of a thimble now, it looks like a joke - except the joke's on you if you pay for this ripoff. I stopped eating there because the quantity has gone down so much, while the price is exhorbitant for the little bit of food you recieve.
But, there's no inflation!
Quality and/or quantity deflation = price inflation
Oh, and by the way, FUCK YOU BERSKANKE!
Interestingly just yesterday my friend was bragging about how she bought sweat pants, a shirt and hoody jacket for $10 total at K-mart. There are some strange price distortions happening.
How did she find a K-Mart that's still open anyway?
"QUALITY"
Does anybody else notice that nothing has any taste anymore.
I hate to admit it but even a Mc Crap burger used to have some flavor - texture all wrong too.
I blame Howard Stern for the loss of taste in America.
You boys constantly claim inflation, but it raelly hasn't been bad YET. In terms of disposable income vs prices. What's interesting though is how much longer will they be able to keep it low? My guess is for a while since the U.S has all of it's own resources except for oil. If we can diversify our energy portfolio into nucleur, solar, and our own oil and gas. Then there's no problem. The U.S still has the largest gold reserves too. I don't see that Crazy inflation any time soon.
Your contrarian stance here is very bold.
ahahah, classic. Well done sir.
It would be interesting to get proof of your speculation about the amount of unencumbered gold the US has.
If that is true, why doesn't the US return the 674 tons of gold that Germany wants returned? If they truly have over 8000 tons like they claim, it should not be a problem. Yet Germany was told it would take 7 years? WTF?
The US has ALL of Germany's missing gold. Really.
It's just that it takes a little time to dig it out of the ground so that it can be returned.
"Worlds largest gold reserves" huh? HA. Good one. Was there a Fort Knox audit and no one told me?
Prices never go up, the value of money, currency, goes down.
The degree that money loses value is directly related to the amount of theft that has been 'printed.'
Strictly speaking, prices can go up without monetary inflation. If you have tightening supply of goods, or increased velocity of money (and no, I don't mean via credit) there will be increased money relative to goods/services.
That's so easy to say, kchrisc.
I told my 77 year old grandfather that very same thing. He called grandma into the room to "listen to the stupid shit they taught this boy in college".
Fucking money managers. the great monetary swindle.
ever get the feeling you've been cheated ? h/t j.lydon
As Jim Willie pointed out in a TF Metals interview in Oct, money printing is pure acid to capital, it dissolves it, and the actual economy with it, so nothing remains but financial toxic-waste.
Simon says buy Chilean inflation protection bonds.
Chilean inflation protection bonds. Wow. Who wudda thunk. I guess I better get some before they're all gone.
dont worry, just buy one of simon's gringo priced one room hovels in the chilean paramo and he will throw the chilean bonds in as a bonus. hurry though. limitied offer
Inflation does a few things. The major ones benefit Banksters and the US Government:
The FED relies on inflation to hide the real cost of Government services. Imagine if deficit financing (via inflation) was not one of the tools for them to use? People would have the data to gauge the value of Government services for their real worth(since some of it would not be hidden by inflation).
The Fractional banking system relies on inflation and the debt multiplier for profits. If they weren't able to lend out the same amount of money many times (and collect on that debt), their business model would fail and they would lose their "Master of the Universe" membership card and secret decoder ring....
Two conspiring assholes with a symbiotic relationship against Joe Taxpayer.
A local restaurant used charge 12.99 for a lasagna dinner 3 years ago. Now it's $16.99. It's been steadily creeping up.
I'm sure there are many people out there wish the PhD lairs in the Fed would feel the pain. All out there don't let Bernanke or his son, a doctor forget the behavior Ben has demonstrated while at the helm of the Fed.
Once the US dollar crashes the Federal Reserve banksters should be held accountable by the citizens of the US.
When Obozo was elected in 2008, gas was $1.69 a gallon and the loaf of bread we usually buy was $2.69. Gas is down right now because TPTB want the sheep out buying Chinese crap for Christmas but usually it is around $3.69 a gallon and the same loaf of bread I refered to is now $4.69. That my freinds is inflation, and that is a tax which robs you of your labor.
once again, obviously obama's fault.
jomama Since you actually used Obama and not one of the usual ZH substitutes like Obozo, Obummer etc. we will assume you are a fan. The fault lies with his masters debasing the money but HE certainly did nothing to stop the printing and douchebaggery that has taken place ON HIS WATCH and if you don't get that then I hope shit gets so expensive that you curse his name with every breath till you do get it !!!!! Who's fucking fault do YOU think it is?
Oh let me say it before you do jomama, IT'S BUSH'S FAULT, right ? Five years plus jomama , when do you stop covering for him? HE's A BIG EPIC FAIL
Sometimes, when you've been ass raped in a dark alley, you don't really get to find out who to blame.
But you've still been ass-raped.
Maybe blame isn't the key part of the equation.
You can get loans to buy tires for your car now. If that is any indication.
Banks blew themselves up in 2008 and they are using FRAUD to steal everyone elses money and to pay for mercenaries to protect them as well as to bribe congress.
The wind has changed direction and we know what time it is.
Hell, you can get loans to buy tires for your cat now. This might be an indicator that there's too much money and not enough stuff backing it up.
How long has it been that salaries haven't increased in real terms? 50 years for the average worker? How can you claim there is no inflation under these circumstances? Have cars, homes, education, food, clothing, and everything else we need to buy not increased in price over the last 50 years???? The elephant in the room is that there has been no increase in income for the average North American over the last 50 years.......in fact it has gone down in real terms for some. Having a second income (the wife) and living in smaller homes and doing with less has helped disguise the fact that the standard of living has been steadily going down. Those in power know this and are doing everything they can to avoid this subject.......yes, I know, unions are BAD and so is the idea of minimum wage....only a free market with low taxes and no government intereference can allow unbridled capitalism to create the optimal conditions......in the meantime your average wage slave gets poorer and poorer...........maybe the wage slaves will figure out one day that the current system ain't working too well and that maybe those folk who fought for higher wages and decent working conditions were onto something........
The current system is working just fine - in fact, it's working really, really well - for those with the right connections.
For the rest of us, maybe not so well (if at all) . . . . .
Same as it ever was.
Same as it EVER was.
- David Byrne
Oh Alphids, you're using the logic taught by antiquidated 20th century parents. What the "man" tells you must be true, this is America, land of the free; and home of the brave.
"How can you claim there is no inflation under these circumstances?"
They don't "claim". They say "it is".
So, it is.
Inflation for the bottom 90%, deflation for the top 10%.
Just because you see one slow motion eagle and flag doesn't mean there's one country or one economy.
We purchased a 2003 Ford Expedition, and paid cash for a $ 30,000 purchase price. The wife and I recently went to look at 2014 Expeditions... Sticker was $59,000. No inflation? Bullshit!
No inflation. The 2014 models are just that much better. You are getting a much more advanced vehicle. /sarc
So true Osmium.
Also, Economics 101, there are fewer vehicles being built, expost facto, dali llama, and e pluris unum; the volume economies have decreased, so of course the vehicle will cost more. No brainer.
with regard to Bernanke's prayer in the post; "If you're going to tell a lie, tell a big one, and repeat it often"---Adolph Hitler---Who does have some credentials as a mass opinion modifier. Recent psychology research shows that statements that repeated frequently by socially approved "experts" tend to be believed in by more and more of the experimental subjects as the repitition continues; even tho they know the assertions are irrational. With regard to the Ford Expedition; I often tell people who are predicting that Gold will "return" to its "correct" price of $450, or something; that yeah, that'll happen as soon as you can buy a new Ford luxury model truck for $8,000. But they usually don't get it.
Tyler thanks for re-running this piece. The content albiet was spot on> The comments were awesome!
yep, fuck inflation and fuck lying about inflation with all the hedonistic pricing model BS.
There's too much money in the system: true, but wait for the great falling apart of the containment apparatus; when the flood hits; maybe as soon as next year; it'll be awesome.
The article states that inflation is good for people in debt. But in fact, inflation is very bad for many people in debt, probably more than half of them. Think about it.
If you're in the workforce near the peak of your lifetime earnings, inflation is indeed good, because your pay or income tends to increase along with inflation, which makes your payments on old loans shrink in terms of your new, higher income.
However, if you're retired, or ending your working career with part-time work or a lower paying job (perhaps because you just can't keep burning as hard as in your 20s, 30s, 40s and 50s), inflation is a killer.
Why? Because you still need to make your debt payments while your expenses are rising (due to inflation) while your income has ended or falling significantly. That's almost the worst of all worlds.
And given the intentional financial repression in place for years (or over a decade when you include the Greenspasm absurdities), this huge batch of regular folks are truly screwed. Before recent years they at least had some ability to compensate for inflation via higher yields on their savings. But not since Greenspasm kicked off this century by driving down interest rates to vanishingly low levels.
So the slice of humanity that actually benefits from high inflation has shrunk dramatically over the past few decades. Now only those with high debt and high present income benefit from inflation (plus everyone in the bankster/financial industry who borrows huge amounts for free from the central paper pushers).
This phenomenon is destroying most "regular folks". The notion that inflation helps people with debt is now obsolete and wrong --- only a minority slice benefit today. Which is why the bulk of wealth in this nation and world are being completely hollowed out and fed to the predators-that-be and predator-class.
Well ideally, inflationary policy is expected to cure debt if there is wage inflation, ie rising nominal wages makes debt payments cheaper. That's the theory behind it. It's possible for wages to inflate "theoretically", not just energy, and food, assets, commodities in general. Problem is, money printers can't control where the money goes. It only works if the people with the debt get higher nominal wages. I suspect it's the reason the ECB may do it's own version of QE, to shore up the banking system.
Very good opinion.
Could that "slice of humanity that actually benefits" have "shrunk dramatically" to say, oh; .01%?
With no mechanism to extinguish debt and to only transfer the debt to a different holder, fiat money systems have to grow to pay interest.
Inflation is easy. The trick is to make people believe it's 'normal' and to be expected.
April Fools.
Math is a pain in the ass.
Inflation is good makes about as much sense as downgrading a company because it "missed" the forecasters earnings by .05 ¢ in a quarter (based on a number snatched out of the air) after 10 quarters of "beating" the forecasted earnings, but it still make a profit of a billion dollars.
Then the algos knock down the share price 15 to 20%, that hour, but not before they make 200 million short trades to pay bonuses in the 9 minutes prior to the beat down and then hypothecate and re-hypothecate to make their next years bonuses.
Meh. No story here. SNAFU.
RICO all banksters, IRS, NSA, NPS, EPA, DOA bureaucrats and their political whores.
A Hershey's chocolate bar in 1965 was 5 cents in a small store. Today, that same bar is $1.29. 48 years, multiplier of 25.8, simple math - (((25.8^(1/48))-1)*100 = 7% average price increase for 48 years to get to that price.
Top of the line Mustang with all bells and whistles back in 1965 was about $2500. Today, that top of the line loaded 'stang is about 45 to 50 thousand (conservative estimate - you do want a radio and carpet don't you?) Same math = 6+ percent price increase *every year* for 48 years.
The candy bar is more interesting to me, because over the last half century the price of that candy bar should have gone down (productivity increases galore - demand of low variance).
The cpi over that period reports 233.504 / 34.8 = 6.71 for about 4% per year average price increase.
A little statistical literacy - long term averages remove noise from estimates. Price levels are a statistical estimate of inflation. Give me historic data of price on something that has arguably maintained it's intrinsic value in our economy and it can yield a good estimate of inflation (money supply increase). When the government removes food and energy from the CPI due to 'volatility', I say give me longer averages (but that would reveal their lies).
Now - here's one for the ages (and I'm not a fan of minimum wage, it's just data to me) - in 1965 the minimum wage was $1.25. 7.25/1.25 = 5.8. Minimum wage is losing ground fast to even the poorly constructed CPI. Look at it this way: In 1965 minimum wage was 25 candy bars. Today it is 5.6 candy bars.
These are the distortions that occur when government and bankers collude to steal wealth through lies and money printing. Sad situation.
I hasten to add that 48 years ago, Hershey bars had actual chocolate in them. Another hidden part of the price increases.
Very true!
- candy: $0.05
- poison: $1.29
Measured in gold, your 1965 hershey bar was 1/20 x 1/35 of a oz of gold, or at todays gold price, $1.82
what exactly is your point?
Just agreeing with the 3 levels of message above me. And adding that not only have prices gone up, but also the quality of ingredients in modern food have fallen, dramatically so. So not only has there been inflation in price, but deflation in quality and value.
"I’m not entirely sure how inflation can be ‘benign’ while consumer prices are simultaneously rising."
Simple. Via the BS of hedonics and substitution.
http://seekingalpha.com/article/24933-substitutions-and-hedonics-inflation-data-absurdities