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Post by kerouac2 on Apr 12, 2023 18:08:10 GMT
Inflation itself is not debatable in terms of "are you for or against inflation?" But the reasons for inflation and how it is affecting us are definitely worthy of commentary. First of all, here is the current situation. Some countries are clearly hurting more than others. But who are we accusing? The greedy bastards? Russia? China? Nobody's fault -- shit happens?
I very well remember the 1980s when inflation was between 10 and 15% but I don't remember who was being accused besides OPEP (and of course the greedy bastards). There may have been droughts and crop failures and animal diseases, but it is all forgotten now.
I myself only noticed most prices creeping up slowly at the supermarket until very recently. But this month they seem to be skyrocketing in France, especially the small items that I suppose we are not supposed to notice. Some little things just jumped from 1.20€ to 1.80€. Fruits and vegetables have certainly also gone up considerably, although there was a report on the news today saying that some of the big supermarket chains have reduced their profit margin on most produce to 0% because they know that it is what people notice first, so they just hope that it will make them notice less the rise of meat and canned goods, dairy products and the rest.
Some of the increases are due more to the plastic containers than what is in them. One of the major bottled water companies (Badoit) has just switched to clear colourless bottles instead of the iconic red and green that they were using, because this reduces the cost and is also easier to recycle. I bet we never thought of such small details.
For the moment, though, it looks like we just have to suffer.
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Post by cheerypeabrain on Apr 12, 2023 20:16:02 GMT
Same here in England. Our grocery bill has increased by around 40%, and that's taking into account the fact that we've really cut back. I still buy a lot of fresh fruit and vegetables but I make sure that we use every scrap. I plan more too..to make sure that I only buy what we need..hardly any impulse buys these days. The energy bills are awful, despite the government payments made to every household. We tend to avoid using the fire in the living room if it's a bit chilly. Just put on a cardigan of use a blanket. The radiators were turned off when we had a brief warm spell a few weeks ago...Jeff has a calor gas heater in the garage the sneaky ratbag, but if I was really cold I'd put the fire on...because he's not the boss of me Petrol prices are supposed to be coming down. Not that we use much.
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Inflation
Apr 12, 2023 21:19:44 GMT
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Post by whatagain on Apr 12, 2023 21:19:44 GMT
Badoit story is nonsense. To make red and green bottles, you need clear glass and you add pigments. No amount if sorting will allow to recycle badoit bottles into badoit bottles. Clear glass + pigments, then recycled as coloured glass, thys need clean clear glass to next prodyction. If they stopped the color, they save the pigments.
Nevertheless inflation is good for house owners (or globally people borrowing money) as we usually take flat rates. So if i make 2000 euros a month, and pay 500 for my real estate credit at say a flat rate of 2% :with no inflation, i still pay 25% of my income 5 years later to repay the credit. If i have 10% inflation and am lucky to get payrises of 10%, after 5 years i get 3000 euros per month (actually more, i would get 2000x1.1x1.1x1.1x1.1x1.1) and still my flat rate for the credit. Meaning my house costs me only 17% of my income (500 out if 3000). Instead of 25%. Now if i rent, my costs follow inflation. As usual, the rich gets richer.
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Post by bjd on Apr 13, 2023 7:06:32 GMT
As mentioned by Kerouac, supermarkets are advertising low prices on a list of items. According to a consumer watchdog, these are mostly store-brand or low-cost things. In the past few months, I have noticed a big increase in the cost of fresh fruit and vegetables at the market, so probably due to higher costs for the producers as well as transport, dairy products like milk, cheese and butter, and gasoline. Bread has gone up too even though French bread is made with French flour. But certainly nowhere near 40%.
Whatagain, I thought the Badoit bottles in question were plastic, in which case the recycling story might not be nonsense. Our supermarket has a bottle container for plastic bottles (all those bottles of water people buy!) but it only accepts clear ones, not coloured ones.
I have never known what the government's "inflation basket" actually contains, but even though official inflation remains around 6 or 7% in France, they admit that food inflation is around 15%.
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Post by cheerypeabrain on Apr 13, 2023 7:48:10 GMT
Some price increases have been more than others. Prices have always increased over time..it's the rate of increase that's scary. More sneaky are the manufacturers shrinking their products too. I usually have a pot of glacé cherries in the baking cupboard. The pot size has been 250g for as long as I can remember and my recipe for cherry and almond cake (as well as other fruit cake recipes) calls for 250g glacé cherries, washed and chopped Now supermarkets are selling the cherries in 200g pots (cost more too). Hidden price hikes. A packet of fig biscuits used to have 11 biscuits (4 each for Jeff and Russell, 3 for me!) But now there are 10 biscuits in a packet. Don't buy them now...even tho theyre only 50p...
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Post by kerouac2 on Apr 13, 2023 10:02:07 GMT
Unfortunately, the shrinking size price increases have been a trick since long before the current crisis.
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Inflation
Apr 13, 2023 16:56:57 GMT
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Post by whatagain on Apr 13, 2023 16:56:57 GMT
One of my favourite marketung stodies is an increase of size if a product. Sugar. You usually drip ine ir 2 blocks in tour coffee or tea. At a certain moment, sugar makers increased the size if the blick by 10pc. You still drop the same amount of blocks, but you pay yiur sugar by the kgm.
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Inflation
Apr 13, 2023 16:59:07 GMT
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Post by whatagain on Apr 13, 2023 16:59:07 GMT
Vhd, ciuld be right, i never buy water un pkastic bottle so thought of glass...
Now in Belgium we put all our plastic in a recycling bag. All colours mixed, soft and hard plastic.
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Post by cheerypeabrain on Apr 20, 2023 21:32:37 GMT
Inflation was in the news this week. Again. Food inflation is at 19 - 20%. Our grocery bill has now increased by a third. Admittedly we are still buying the products that we prefer, the expensive coffee both ground and instant. The 'better quality' washing powder, washing up liquid and similar. We've tried the cheap stuff and we don't like it...so we pay through the nose.
Free range chickens DO taste better...and I'd rather buy my meat and poultry from a local producer...you'd think that these local-farm supplied markets and butchers would be cheaper than the supermarket equivalent...but they're not. A medium sized free range chicken from a local butcher was £13 whereas the mass produced chickens in my local supermarkets are less than half that. I haven't managed to get to the monthly farmers market held in the city centre for a while...but when I do I try to stock up on meat and poultry. I wonder if this will now be too expensive to do.
I rarely buy bottled water, prefering to fill a plastic bottle from the tap...but with our failing (privatised) water companies discharging raw sewage into the rivers with no consequences then maybe bottled drinking water will be our only option.
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Inflation
Apr 21, 2023 6:44:03 GMT
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Post by whatagain on Apr 21, 2023 6:44:03 GMT
My god... our water companies are too mNy and political, so a refuge for incomoetent friends of friends of poluticians but at least our water is very good ... and iur trains run. Lots of things gone awry in the UK...
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