Posted on 07/28/2015 5:48:22 PM PDT by Olog-hai
Apartment rents are up. So are prices for restaurant meals, haircuts, gym memberships and a cup of coffee.
For American consumers who have become used to flat or even falling prices for several years, an unfamiliar sight has emerged in many corners of the economy: Inflation is ticking up.
The price increases remain modest. And in many cases, they’re canceled out by price declines for other items that are keeping overall inflation historically low.
Yet the stepped-up price tags for a range of consumer items are the largest since the Great Recession ended six years ago. They actually reflect a healthier economy: Many businesses have finally grown confident enough to pass their own higher costs on to consumers without fear of losing customers. Employers have added nearly 5.6 million jobs the past two years, allowing more people to absorb higher prices.
Signs of emergent inflation are a key reason the Federal Reserve, which is meeting this week, will likely raise interest rates from record lows later this year. Inflation has long trailed the Fed’s 2 percent target rate but is on track to return to that level in coming months. …
(Excerpt) Read more at hosted.ap.org ...
How can this be??? As long as I am not buying anything except computers and TVs there is zero inflation. Just because food, energy, and everything else is more expensive doesn’t mean prices are rising. Right?
“For American consumers who have become used to flat or even falling prices for several years”
They’ve been spouting this BS for years (ever since Obama’s election, in fact); food prices have been consistently climbing the whole time, and we get a new excuse each year (usually weather). One of the reasons the economy is in the crapper is because necessities have eaten up so many peoples’ discretionary dollars, and the government keeps understating inflation to screw those receiving government payments (Social Security, welfare, etc.). I believe this plays a key role in the discontent of our unassimilated permanent underclass (they’ve basically gotten a “welfare pay cut”), and when governments (all the way up to the president) are pushing for minimum wage increases they are acknowledging price increases all along.
“They actually reflect a healthier economy”
They’re trying to stay ahead of this. I realize it’s a small sample set, but ALL BUT ONE of my favorite places to eat went up by 20% to 30% almost exactly, or maybe exactly, at the start of the year - just when one of Obamacare’s major mandates came in.
They know that they CANNOT hide these price increases, so the next best thing is to tell them it happens when you have an economy steamrolling along (LOL).
You double your labor costs - how much do you raise your prices?
What planet do these clowns live on?
For the last ten years or so, "Costs" have held steady or increased very little, because the "official" figures are manipulated to make it so.
Think about all the necessities that make your life possible, or at worst tolerable. Fewer and fewer of those items are reflected in the official "Cost of Living Index." or in "inflation" figures.
Unless you are on welfare, that is.
Wow- glad I cut my own hair....
The one grocery item where the producers can’t “hide” the inflation is beer. Some people may not notice the 1-1/2 quart 1/2 gallon of ice cream, but if a beer goes to 10 oz., there will be hell to pay!
Seems like those $6.99 six-packs are long gone. Now all the stuff I like is $8.99 or more, even. Time to find another pastime, or start brewing my own.
In this cartoon there is another stupidity, one of the employes is fired so if both were making min wage you are left with one making 15/hr. A zero effect on labor costs for the establishment.
Heh. For members of the Keynes/Krugman school this will be touted as proof that the economy is growing.
Funny! (well, not really...)
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