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Article about Midland. Nog far from me, I lived there for years before I moved back to California.

Highest Inflation in America Is Punishing a Texas Town and Its Residents

Midland, Texas, is strung between El Paso and Dallas along Interstate 20, and more than four hours’ drive from either big city. Its far-flung location makes everything costlier and harder to get, including workers and vehicles, which you need to go anywhere in the spread-out region with limited public transportation. Add to that the local economy’s reliance on oil, and you get the unenviable No. 1 spot for inflation over the past year.

Listen to this story.

Menus at local restaurants have sticky notes telling diners that prices have been raised. A gallon of milk has surged to about $6 at local gas stations, often the closest option for basics. And each Wednesday, a growing line of hundreds of cars forms outside the area’s largest food bank.

Inflation in Midland has hovered near 10% for the past six months, more than any of the about 400 metropolitan areas tracked by Moody’s Analytics — and well above the national average.

On the ground, the implications are very real for Bo Garrison, owner of Permian Dirt Works LLC. He and his 20 workers use about two dozen trucks, excavators and bulldozers to dig, flatten and haul several tons of caliche rock and earth each day, creating roads and level extraction sites called “pads” for energy companies.

A few weeks ago over enchiladas at a Mexican restaurant in town, a Caterpillar Inc. salesperson gave Garrison some bad news: There were no more bulldozers available. Shortly after that, his primary car dealer told him something previously unthinkable: There were no new Ford F-250s available in Midland until at least 2023.

Garrison’s company will have to pay more for repairs and rentals and try to pass on the cost — and in some cases may have to pass on some contracts. Other expenses are piling up, including wages, which he raised up to 20% in the past year, and $650 a day for employees’ fuel — nearly double the amount just a few months ago.

“Now I gotta cross my fingers and pray that my mechanics are taking care of the equipment because if they break, that’s it,”

https://au.finance.yahoo.com/news/highest-inflation-america-punishing-texas-040101336.html