Posted on 08/15/2007 7:08:15 PM PDT by shrinkermd
MIDLAND, Va. — The Labor Department's most recent inflation data showed that U.S. food prices rose by 4.2 percent for the 12 months ending in July, but a deeper look at the numbers reveals that the price of milk, eggs and other essentials in the American diet are actually rising by double digits.
Already stung by a two-year rise in gasoline prices, American consumers now face sharply higher prices for foods they can't do without. This little-known fact may go a long way to explaining why, despite healthy job statistics, Americans remain glum about the economy.
Meeting with economic writers last week, President Bush dismissed several polls that show Americans are down on the economy. He expressed surprise that inflation is one of the stated concerns.
"They cite inflation?" Bush asked, adding that, "I happen to believe the war has clouded a lot of people's sense of optimism."
But the inflation numbers reveal the extent to which lower- and middle-income Americans are being pinched.
The Bureau of Labor Statistics said in its July inflation report that egg prices are 33.7 percent higher than they were in July 2006. Over the same period, according to the department's consumer price index, whole milk was up 21.1 percent; fresh chicken 8.4 percent; navel oranges 13.6 percent; apples 8.7 percent. Dried beans were up 11.5 percent, and white bread just missed double-digit growth, rising by 8.8 percent.
(Excerpt) Read more at mcclatchydc.com ...
I am hearing it from people that used to just kind of shrug me and my frugal ways off.
I have a friend with a daughter the same age as mine, but she also has one 6 years younger, yet she spent about 3 times more than I did a week on groceries for her family of four than I did for my family of 3.
A year ago we were both stay at home moms that handled most of the transporting of the older girls to whatever, both did volunteer work, did the cleaning and laundry and running the household, but she claimed she didn't have time to cook, at that time I also had a part time job working in the evening, yet I either cooked or planned meals every day.
She now works fulltime, and I've got a part time job again. Needless to say, her grocery bill has now gone up even more because she claims she has no time to shop properly, something she never did before anyway, let alone cook.
My freezer is stocked with fruit, veggies, meat, broth, sauces, and the like. Hers is stocked with Stouffer's. Is it any wonder a friend who recently saw a picture of her 9 year old, at my 9 yar old's b'day party commented the child looked like she was 16 and pregnant?
And producing ethanol with corn is a bad move.
Only several meals?
I've gone from making soup in an 8 quart pot to a 20 quart pot, and occassionally I will use the 33 quart pot. Granted I generally use the 33 quart pot for making broth/stock, because it has a steamer insert---but I still have a 33 quart pot :)
How I wish.........
I haven't seen either of te gentlemen I told you about to ask them about a cow, maybe this weekend.
my cousin gave up all foods containing high fructose corn syrup and lost about 30 pounds in a short period of time
What is your favorite sauce or seasoning mix for baked spaghetti squash?
Gosh, I'm getting hungry!
Your post made me think of a classmate from the Eastern Shore of MD. She had a terrible fever and her relatives had put onions in pantyhose in different locations on her.
Finally, she went to the hospital. Too sick to take care of it herself and forgetting about the onions, she didn't say anything as the attendants started taking off her clothes - and onions fell out and rolled all over the emergency room floor!
Turns out she had menningitis.
i believe it.
i read somewhere several years ago that hfcs was synthesized by a japanese scientist
in the early 1970’s.
people see “corn” and think “natural” but it’s not a natural-occurring sweetener.
Do you have light soil. You probably have an extreme nematode problem and while they will affect a lot of crops they really, really affect root crops.
Does the fact that you live on a farm help with the food budget?
Ya need to get away from the boardwalk :) just kidding.....to a point.
Lots of people don’t want to pay the prices the establishments in OC would charge and so that is why they don’t have them, because people aren’t buying them.
I buy my clams from the same guy that supplies a lot of the restaurant on Chincoteague, and I pay the same price as the restaurants. I know all about market up and profit, etc....but I sure as heck am not going to plunk down 10 bucks a dozen for steamed clams when I know they are only paying $20 per 100. None of us had a problem with $6 a dozen, now only tourists are buying them. Places only charging $5 or 6 are getting all the local business.
How do you fix spaghetti squash? It is something I can get by the bushel for free, along with butternut squash. I have never liked it the ways I’ve fixed it.
When my kids were little and had chest colds my Dr. prescribed boiling onions.
Mr. President, you personally have clouded my sense of optimism.
50 gallons of ethanol/acre. Sounds like a zero net gain to me.
I'm going to the fridge and see what else I can burn as fuel.
One of our very favorite meals is putting our favorite spaghetti sauce on the baked squash. I bake by cutting the squash lengthwise and removing the seed cavity. Place flat side down on a baking sheet and bake at 350 for 45 minutes or so.
Thank you for understanding.
After 25 years, my “on the floor” activism days are pretty much over. I’ll make phone calls, send emails, post on sites, to a certain extent, but I’m basically burned out. I’m going to stick with my little farming operation and jam/jelly and craft business now.
You're not kidding. I live and work near the I-95 corridor in between Baltimore and DC, which is an expensive, well developed, and congested metropolitan area in its own right. But every time I drive into Northern VA I feel like I'm in another world. Can I suggest that you folks place a moratorium on all new building permits, restrict your women to having only one child, and ban the sale of new automobiles?
Freeze the tomatoes and the beans.........it’s too hot for canning.
And thus zuccini bread is bred :)
My problem with root crops has nothing to do with the soil, it all has to do with the farmer (me).......
I have this “visual” need with my crops and so the root crops just don’t work for me. I get potatoes up the yingyang from the farmers I know, so buyin onions, garlic, and carrots is realy not that big a deal to me. I’m doing pretty danged good if that is all I’m buying.
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