Call it what you will.. recession, depression, stagflation, inflation

[SoCalDem]

Call it the Screaming Mee-Mees or the Hee-Bee-Jeebees..

Whatever we "call" it.. we HAVE it.. we have HAD it for a very long time now,. and have been avoiding the "cure".

Prices only ever go UP, and wages either stay the same or go DOWN.. You don't have to be a Rhodes Scholar to see the problem here.

About the only thing we manufacture here is "want". We want everything...the TV tells us that we "need" these things, but really, we just "want" them.

A trip to the supermarket today reminded me of the "illness" we seem to have:

$2.99 lb tomatoes
$5.99 lb bing cherries
$1.39 a head lettuce
$1.79 lb apples
$1.41 for a QUART of lowfat milk
$8.99 lb for t-bone steaks
$1.19 lb for russett potatoes
$.79 lb for bananas

And yes, I did buy those cherries..dammit I actually NEEDED them:)

ALL of these produce items are technically "in season" and should be at their lowest price.
I did NOT buy the steaks, but I did look at them. I bought chicken $1.99 lb for chicken breasts.

This is but one part of our economy, but food is something that everyone has to have.

Combine this with all the other "stuff", and try to pay for it with ever-shrinking pay and it's not surprising that this vast and "fantastic economy" (according to our president) is being held together with string, glue, rubber bands and well-worn credit cards.

[shaniqua6392]

1. I keep waiting for the whole thing to blow up.

Somehow they are hanging onto it by a thread. All those years of Bush telling people that he is so great and now people who could never afford a home are able to buy one!! Well, isn't that wonderful? 1.2 million home foreclosures last year. Almost a million already this year. Bankruptcies at historic highs. Jobs created??? What kind of jobs? Now we need three jobs and we still have no health insurance. It is going to blow. I feel that they can not stop it. They just keep plugging the holes, but it is still bleeding profusely. They are going to try to stop it from crashing while he is prez so they can blame it on the Dem who will be elected prez next year. I hope it does not work out that way.

[Johnny Noshoes]

2. The storm is comin'

and it is going to be NASTY - I'm thinking like you that if it is coming hopefully it will arive while the Moran is still in the White House so the next President doesn't get the blame for it.

[fasttense]

3. Helicopter Ben, by buying up billions of failing hedge fund paper, has insured

inflation, or should I say hyperinflation, will continue. The only prices he wants to see decline is our middle class wages. Get those wheelbarrows ready to lug those dollars to the store.

[SpiralHawk]

4. I call it "Republicon-ification"

We will have our "special" "self-proclaimed elite" Have More Republicon Homelanders.

And then there will be the little people, the proles.

Screw that. Why do republicons HATE America?

[Sherman A1]

5. I have been seeing some hefty price increases for about 3 years now

in grocery. I didn't stay in a Holiday Inn Express last night, but do work in a grocery store and do the price advances every Sunday AM. Some of course of it is due to the price of fuel rippling through the economy, some is due to the price of corn going up (the ethanol thing), some is due to increased health care costs (thank goodness we are a union store that provide health care to us worker bees - after 2 years of employment), some is just because of increased costs of whatever. In any case we no longer see increase of a 5 or 10 cent variety, they are more in the 25 cent to multiple $$'s and it's just plain nuts. A bag of charcoal not only went up in price but, went from 20 to 18 lbs (I am lucky I can still sell the broken bags to the employees without the grocery store police "loss prevention" nailing us for stealing and do they ever love to do that because that is bonus $'s to them). It is harder and harder to make ends meet for so many people and you are absolutely correct food is something we must all have.



BTW - Bananas are 49 cents /lb here in St. Louis /Cherries match your price, but the season is pretty much over on them and we won't see them in a few weeks.


:toast:

[newportdadde]

6. Wrong! If I exclude volatile food and energy costs from your list then you have 0 inflation.

Now go buy yourself one of those nice new TVs with more features.

[SoCalDem]

7. No doubt with HD for the DVD and the PVR and the e-i-e-i-o

Now quit bothering me.. Gotta watch reruns of Green Acres