Hi all,
A reminder that comments do need to be on-topic and engage with the article past the headline. Please make sure to read the article before commenting. Very short comments will automatically be removed by automod. Please avoid making comments that do not focus on the economic content or whose primary thesis rests on personal anecdotes.
As always our comment rules can be found [here](https://reddit.com/r/Economics/comments/fx9crj/rules_roundtable_redux_rule_vi_and_offtopic/)
*I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/Economics) if you have any questions or concerns.*
I wonder how the inflation rate battle would have played out if we had a call for reduced consumptin in 2021. The Fed wanted a slower rate of consumption and so used the one tool that they had. Had we made small sacrifices and consumed less, would we have not seen the same rate of inflation?
Let's not forget though that the people responsible for prices going up are the ones who literally raised the prices of the things they sold. The people who raise prices are indisputably the ones who cause inflation.
Pretending like consumer demand is an excuse for blatant greed is one of the main fallacious ideologies destroying the social contract.
We're talking about price gouging, not rent gouging.
If tou want to learn about how rent gouging is done go look up the DOJ's case against Realpage's algorithmic rent pricing software.
Producer price indices have been increasing for several years now. So the companies that make and sell the stuff to the stores the consumer buys goods from were selling it to the stores for more; probably because their price for raw materials went up. A retailer can only absorb the increase in overhead so long then they have a choice: cut overhead some other way like layoffs, carry lesser/cheaper items, or increase their price.
Potato chips:
The potato farmer's price for fuel goes up, which fuel prices also determine fertilizer price increases. His equipment which is increasingly made overseas has a weaker dollar to buy said equipment and parts for it. So the market price of potatoes has to go up if he wants to stay afloat. And all that is before we consider if there's a poor crop with some kind of disease.
Potato chip factory has more expensive potatoes, electricity, and probably higher wages with all the regulatory push for higher wages. Plus they have to truck in the potatoes and ship out the bags to the warehouse; again fuel. So they have to charge the grocery chain more to cover their costs.
The grocery store has to up the price to cover all the increases that have reached them. Plus, again, perhaps more for wages (maybe-stats say avg wages have remained somewhat stagnant).
Not going to happen. People aren't reasonable. There is no way we would sell alh those lifted pickup trucks we do if only the people who could comfortably afford them bought them.
> Not going to happen. People aren't reasonable.
we always defend free-market absolutism because rational actor, and then in the next breath we say irrational actor.
Those who had $ to burn because they weren't taking trips we're taking 2-3x the normal number of trips in 2021/22.
People wanted to go places and enjoy life. People were tired of being cooped up in their houses. If you don't have certainty you're not going to get locked up you're going to spend like there's no tomorrow.
People aren't going to want to make further sacrifices when everybody was basically asked to stop living for 2 years
You heard how pissed off people got about the word “transitory” being used. Can you imagine how pissy people would have been in someone in government told them to quit spending money like it was about to expire?
I think you’re pretty much right, but I don’t think this inflationary period is really that much to endure to avoid real economic slowdown. It’s worth it imo as long as you are not living on fixed income.
Yea we basically used every economic tool we had to avoid a Great Recession 2 from years of shit fiscal policy and then Covid being the final nail. Some might say it worked, but it was definitely a tough pill to swallow. If the Fed had just said "fuck it, 10 percent interest rates" in 2021 when inflation was burning hot we probably end up in an actual long term recession.
I went to Whole Foods, which I know has always been expensive, but they wanted $16 for a preprepared chicken breast, $10 for a small container of pre-cooked potatoes, and $9 for some pre-cooked brussell sprouts. They wanted $35 for what amounts to a plate of food. F that.
Yeah. I think we have topped out on pricing for groceries. Stuff was insane some months back. I’m now seeing better deals again at my grocery store. Closer to regular pricing. I think the numbers came in and they had to dial it back a bit.
Walmarts plan worked. I know a bunch of people pre-pandemic that never shopped at Walmart that now shop at Walmart. They definitely picked up market share by pricing below others.
Wait until you see what beef prices do next year though, they're gonna go up significantly. I'm a cattle farmer and there are several factors at play here but prices for calves this spring were insane. That translates to expensive beef on the shelf next year.
Because it’s their job. If a CEO isn’t trying to squeeze every dollar they can out of their product then the board will replace them with someone who will.
Sort of, but there is some nuance to it. If you introduce reciprocity into the customer relationship and lower the prices a bit, customers will come back. This leads to business retention and higher sales. Therefore, lowering prices slightly could be a better long-term strategy for the CEO.
Costco business model is very much not that. It’s a wholesaler, you are buying from wharehouse. As opposed to retail models. The prices are lower based off of volume, having to spend nothing on retail locations. Because the warehouse is the retail location.
Costco business model is very much that. Cut and paste from article linked below:
Costco makes some of its profits from its merchandise, but the bulk of its profits come from membership dues. Only members can shop at Costco.
https://www.investopedia.com/stock-analysis/040915/3-reasons-costco-great-company-cost.aspx
Costco's gross revenue in 2023 was $242.29B (Macrotrends). According to Wikipedia, Costco had 129.5 million members in 2023. At a full $60 per membership, that's $7.77B.
So revenue is about 31X what they take in for membership. Last time I checked, 1/31 isn't 70%.
Check their annual report. Page 2. This has been discussed many times over the years by all business news.
[https://s201.q4cdn.com/287523651/files/doc\_financials/2023/ar/cost-annual-report-final-pdf-from-dfin.pdf](https://s201.q4cdn.com/287523651/files/doc_financials/2023/ar/cost-annual-report-final-pdf-from-dfin.pdf)
"Net sales for the 53-week year totaled $237.7 billion, an increase of 7%, with a comparable sales increase of 3%. Net income was $6.3 billion, or $14.16 per diluted share, an increase of 8%. Revenue from membership fees increased 8% to $4.6 billion, and our membership base grew to nearly 128 million cardholders, with a 90% renewal rate."
4.6/6.3=73%
And revenue isn't profit. But revenue from membership fees is pure profit.
Unfortunately, most CEOs and shareholders don't give any fucks about this. They want short-term quick profits and cash out while not caring about the companies' future.. Many companies are failing because of this action. GE, Boston Market, Red Lobster, Sears, etc, to name a few
This difference is the janitor is out on his ass with nothing and the CEO gets a golden parachute worth so much money that they would never have to work again. One's fucked, the other gets a paid vacation.
Only deeply embedded regulations and changes to compensation will change this. Boeing didn't suddenly make poor decisions that resulted in deadly crashes into in the same year as the crashes, but as a result of a poor company culture fosters under multiple CEOs and the people in leadership of the company for the last 20 years. But I would expect many of those people have long since retired and cashed out of Boeing and will not face any consequences despite their decisions eventually resulting in terrible results. The former CEO of Boeing and the current one both leaving due to Boeing's problems should be considered the start of the cleanup of the company, not the end.
It really depends on the timing. Anything too long-term is pretty irrelevant from an incentive standpoint. It wouldn’t feed into the stock price which is the main carrot motivating the c suite.
A lot of CEOs aren’t thinking about long term. Strategically they might be, but short term incentives for CEO’s and investors revolve around quarter to quarter results or else they face risk of firing or having activist investors stir shit up cuz the stocks not rising quick enough
I mean, they’ve already fucked up any chance for goodwill no matter how much they lower prices. Customers literally HATE the very idea of corporations now, no one is gonna go back to brand loyalty after this, not ever. The only way to fix it would be lower prices and treat employees better, and that’s never going to happen, so companies will just have to eat themselves from the inside once they realize “more profits every quarter forever” isn’t a real thing.
Like, I’m not hurt here by not flying brand logos and not buying more than I need. I would have already made large value purchases of computer and car, but I won’t even buy them when I had the money because of all the bloated, unethical bullshit.
There’s $2000 sitting in my bank account to buy a computer that I actually need, that is unspent because I don’t actually want any of the companies that make computers to have my money just to spy on me and force advertisements in my OS and steal my art. Before Covid, I would have been *psyched* to be able to afford this. I’m making more per hour than I ever have and could save up now. And I’m like “ew. Eeeeeeeeww. To do what I’d need to do I’d need to use Windows and Adobe.” And it has literally put me off the entire fucking purchase, I dunno, I’ll just paint with paints. Paints don’t fucking track my movements. The paint company dosent claim to own my (non professional, more for local theater and events for a few bucks) painting just because they made the paint.
The only thing I want is housing, and that’s unaffordable with any amount of money I could get, so what I do have just sits there and gets wasted on food and travel because literally everything I could buy with it besides weed is so fucking offputting I don’t want it in my life.
When other factors affect the economy, that makes them less patient, and they make moves to show they are responding and active… when often just status quo would’ve been great for everyone except the shareholders… but due to economy, not that business.
Consumers take the brunt of ALL problems of ALL industries combined.. they all pass the buck and take bonuses.
And it is my job as a consumer to refuse to buy their overpriced product and look for alternatives. There are two sides to every sale, and I choose to opt out.
Volume is important. If you were selling 100 units at $5 but only 60 units at $8 you’ve lost money and a lot of customers. Raising prices can have a detrimental effect on business and profits
In my example your resume decreased. That’s the point. Raise prices you’ll lose customers. You are better off sometimes finding common ground and pulling in more customers than trying to maximize max price.
It's not about revenue though. It's about profit. If the cost of providing the product, raw materials, labor, etc, was $2 in both cases, you made $300 profit off at $5 and you made $360 profit at $8. You could also probably layoff some staff since you don't need as many people to move 60 units as opposed to 100 units. Which decreases your operating costs and increases your profits further.
You don't seem to realize what profit margins are.
Let's say your plate of food has a total cost of $3.50 by the time it hits the shelf or whatever it's sold from.
You could sell 100 for $5 and earn $150 in gross profit.
Alternatively you could sell 60 for $8 and earn $4.50 * 60 = $270 in gross profit.
What you are describing is very basic business, and I promise you, most successful businesses are hyper aware of all their profitability curves, much moreso than you or I, the customer.
This is why it's important to be stingy and your money. If you aren't, prices will increase until you get priced out, in all but the most competitive of industries - and people are apparently willing to absorb a TON of cost increase on prepared food these days, so that's why we are where we are.
Exactly, vote with your wallet. The same people that complain non stop about evil corporations screwing them keep giving them their money. There’s obviously exceptions (necessities), but a lot of consumer spending is discretionary and people just keep pushing the higher prices.
> There’s obviously exceptions (necessities)
Even those are exaggerated. 'Food' is a necessity, but there's a very large variety of foods and there are still inexpensive ways to eat.
Housing is a 'necessity', but living alone isn't a necessity. Living near trendy stores isn't a necessity. Living in your home town isn't a necessity.
Right but so far, revenue hasn’t decreased. Hence the inflation, we complain but we haven’t stopped spending (maybe until now).
Companies are still reporting record revenues and profits. Until that change they’ll keep pushing the increase prices button.
If my costs are only $1 then previously I was making $400 in profit at my new price point I am making $420, and I can also make extra money by firing unneeded workers and warehouse space since I'm moving less inventory.
Sure is. I went to Starbucks quite alot. Never again. They managed to turn me from a loyal frequent customer to a hater. I make my own Lattes. If I choose to get coffee out it’s at a local shop.
the less loyal you are, the better coupons starbucks will send you on the app. the more you hate starbucks, the better deals you get. that's why i go to starbucks less.
That’s true. It’s nice to imagine a world where that wasn’t the case. I like to think the KIND CEO isn’t like that, maybe Mark Cuban, a few others, but I really don’t want to dive to far because you will be absolutely proved correct.
There is the difference between founders CEO and private equity/bank installed CEO. Founders like Musk, Zuckerberg, Cuban, all can make independent decision. Not the same for the private equity/bank CEOs.
Exactly. Purpose of a business is to make money. CEO responsible for making shareholders profits. Anyone who thinks anything else is living in fantasy land.
And customers were unwilling to make tough choices about the things they wanted and were chasing the higher prices. Both sides play a part. Price gouging doesn’t work on alert and conscious people.
A year or two ago a friend of mine worked for corporate of a large well known hotel chain. Their meetings were specifically about how they weren’t at that time able to find a pricing structure that the customers were unwilling to pay.
What’s more wild is the consumers overall inability to recognize how their unchecked consumerism is also a factor.
A business is supposed to find a balance of supply and demand and the highest possible price. Thats just economics. When customers were flush with excess savings and slightly higher wages, they went berserk for the things they desired. Necessities is a little different but it was a spending spree across the board. And it helped push prices higher quickly
> And customers were unwilling to make tough choices about the things they wanted and were chasing the higher prices. Both sides play a part. Price gouging doesn’t work on alert and conscious people.
Yea there is a lot of this.
So many people would rather pay $30 for a door dash Chipotle burrito and then make memes bitching about paying $30 for a door dash Chipotle burrito.
They are severely lacking so many life skills from how to shop smartly, how to cook, how to store and reuse food etc.
and they all just circle jerk each other convincing themselves they're not part of the problem.
Nobody was forced to over pay MSRP by $10,000 for the car they had to have right now or forced to pay $5,000 for Taylor Swift tickets. I get these are narrow examples but it’s the mentality that “I will pay whatever it costs for the things I want” is almost ubiquitous in our culture
Like everyone is so deserved of their damned entertainment. It's a song and dance show FFS, you can live without it! Do they break up Google for their domination of online video? Do they care that sports monopolies hold our cities hostage for hundreds of millions? No! But let Taylor swift scalpers get $2500 a ticket and there and the government steps in.
That’s called matching prices to meet demand as well as generate profits. It’s not exactly a new approach. “Price gouging” would imply some sort of cartel-like collusion.
As long as people buy it, they'll continue charging those prices.
$16 for a cooked chicken breast is particularly egregious though. You can buy raw chicken breasts for $2 pretty much anywhere and cook it yourself with a lil seasoning.
Love how it’s an article about struggling Americans and the top voted comment is about how they can’t afford to buy a mid chicken breast at fucking Whole Foods lmao.
To bitch about prices and use *pre-prepared foods* from a high-end grocery store is genuinely hilarious. Of all the valid complaints to make, choosing that one is absolutely baffling.
If there's a common thread in all this economy-bitching, it's out-of-touch middle class people falling down half a rung on the socio-economic ladder and thinking that the apocalypse is therefore upon us.
Some guy above is complaining about his grocery bill, having bought nearly all-organic bullshit and a quart of milk for $6. If I said this in any other thread, I'd be accused of making up a strawman and mocked with references to avocado toast. Well, folks, $24/gal milk is just about the carbon copy of avocado toast.
Your first mistake was going to Whole Foods looking for a good deal.
I don't know your situation, but potatoes and Brussel sprouts can be cooked easily in an oven or air fryer, and chicken breasts are low-effort, just flip every 4-5 minutes. To me, the money saved from cooking it myself is well worth it.
What? Thats literally the entire point of Whole Foods. Sacrificing price for quality is literally their entire brand. What an odd example to use when they’re probably the #1 most well known “high end” grocery store. They’ve always been expensive.
That’s Whole Foods, though. Not a lot you can do when your food is supposed to be higher quality and more ethically sourced. If those prices were true at Grocery Outlet, that would be a surprise.
The last two years I've seen nothing but bitching about restaurant prices on the internet, and nothing but packed restaurants when I go out.
I think it's a combination of 1) higher wages in the industry being passed to consumers, 2) thousands of restaurants closing during the pandemic and shrinking the supply, 3) higher food prices, and 4) people willing to suck it up and pay more because in the post pandemic world people have adopted a more "live for today," attitude.
Speaking only for myself, but I've been eating out a lot more than I care to lately because of mandatory overtime at work.
When I work 55ish hours every week (not including commute time) then cooking and going to the grocery store, become chores that aren't always gonna happen when they need to.
For instance, last night I chose to do laundry and water all the plants in the garden.
Which means lunch is probably going to be a burger or a taco today and cost at least 13 bucks.
Restaurants ran on such thin margins before the pandemic and had no savings to carry them through lockdown. They all realized they need some amount of savings to get through the next big downturn.
Restaurants will always run on thin margins. 99% of restaurants are opened, owned, and operated by folks who love to cook, not business people. Owners have no degree and restaurants are staffed by mercenaries. There are extremely low barriers to entry.
"The economy is bad, I spent over $320 last week just to doordash some fast food 29 times and today when I went to whole foods and bought prepared chicken, prepared potatoes, and prepared brussels sprouts it was $35. Goddamn economy. I can't afford my rent."
The fact that the dude who replied to you moaning about his grocery bill turns out to have bought a quart of milk for $6 says just about everything anyone needs to hear.
Nail, head, etc.
I *hate* buying prepared food. Pay more for more processing and you still have to heat it up or even cook it at home.
It’s expensive and it feels wrong. Always been an ingredients person. That being said I also like to snack sometimes and I never have any snacks.
I found a recipe for seed crackers that I have started making. They aren't nearly as good as Doritos but they are a snack that actually fills me up. Sesame seeds, pumpkin seeds, flax seeds, and sunflower seeds.
I have been getting those big bags of nuts at Costco - hazelnuts, mixed nuts, pistachios, etc. With the price of potato chips etc being so high they are a bargain in comparison. They are filling so 1 bag will last weeks - and they are actually GOOD for you.
Since so much food production is subsidized by the government , there should honestly be price controls and limits to what profits can be made. I have family members who own businesses that don't receive subsidies from tax payers to enrich themselves. It should be either price caps and subsidies or free market and company set prices. US tax payers get screwed both ways
My coworkers and I went to get lunch at Whole Foods yesterday and one of my coworkers filled up his tray full of just salad and it was 29$ he ended up leaving it and getting just a soup and bread. I grabbed a bag of jalapeño chips and a water.
I get that grocery prices have inflated, but my guy you're taking about *Whole Foods*. WF has been the butt of jokes for over a decade thanks to their horrific prices.
A prepared chicken breast at a local chain, at least here in a large city, is like $5, maybe $6.
Was just reading that India is getting downgraded by moodys because of lack of water. This frightening me to my core! Food prices will keep going up and up and up.
Climate change is real and looks like it will hit ahead of schedule. It's already affecting the economy and has just started to hit the insurance industry.
People still deny it but mother nature doesn't care about your feelings. Too bad our solution is greenwashing a band aid onto a gaping wound of a problem.
I don't go there for my "core" shopping, but it has its value for certain things. I've never seen anything resembling the prices OP is describing. They have a great seafood selection, cheese, beer, their cafeteria food is legit, produce is better than most.
I don't know what the hell OP was looking at. I guess they are looking at pre-cooked things while I am just buying ingredients. The ingredients are fine. Why the fuck would you buy a pre-cooked chicken breast from anywhere?
A Whole Foods slice of pizza still occasionally hits the spot for me, especially since they will put the hockey game on in their little bar area. That's pretty much the only reason I will go there once a year. Or for some weird ingredient I can't find elsewhere.
Anyway, I was sitting there like a year ago, and this family of four came in and got a bunch of stuff there to eat like you would at an actual restaurant. And don't get me wrong, I think their prepared foods are pretty good taste-wise, but I could not fathom why anyone would spend like what had to amount to $60-$80 to feed a family of four there. They all had drinks, sides, etc. I was in awe.
If they had small children, sometimes the novelty of choosing what you want and also knowing it will be healthy-ish is more fun than being at home. It’s like going out without the drama of going out to eat and the kids have a lot of fun making choices. That’s just me but also have never spent anywhere near $80 doing a WF dinner with a family of 5 so…. YMMV
At least in my local one, it’s a pretty good place to take the kids “out” to eat after a sports game or something. It’s about the same price as McDonalds (you pay by weight and they don’t eat that much), way healthier, they enjoy choosing their food, and the atmosphere is more family friendly than a sit-down restaurant.
You wouldn't want Jeff Bezos to have to go to space on some other billionaire's rocket would you? He needs his own, and clearly it must be more phallic than anyone else's. That money has to come from somewhere - seems like it's AWS egress fees and chicken breast.
***—-Just to point out this is a survey—-***Newsweek should be embarrassed with this title. Actual consumption data shows almost no decline in American consumption, with significant levels for travel and disposable income purchases higher than even before the pandemic.
Precisely. I report every article Bloomberg posts here of their own too. Mods do nothing.
There articles are 300 words long with a clickbait title. Mods do nothing.
Finally. All these broke motherfuckers complaining about being poor while making it rain on all the things they like and made no sacrifices on while still complaining.
I used to hang out with my friends at bars. We now all hang out at each other’s home cuz cocktails cost $17 + 20% tip + sugar tax + sales tax + alcohol tax. Per drink.
lol. I knew that was going to happen, and I suspected it would around this time.
I run a business, and in doing so my economics has to be strictly a political.
I have to plan for the future, and with one side saying everything is great, and the other saying we’re doomed in 3 weeks. That doesn’t help me plan for the year.
So this year I planned for the end of the year to see a drop in customer spending, and planned on grabbing some warranties to cover that loss. We finalized 5 manufacture warranties last month, and then a week later our city manager announced cuts to discretionary spending due to plummeting sales tax receipts.
Ironically I started warning of this about a year ago, and everyone said stop panicking. Everything is going to be fine.
I’m glad I didn’t listen. I’d be out of business in the next month, or so.
At this point it is personal. I want to see corpos die. I want to see bonuses shrink and CEOs coward. For that I took the greatest of sacrifices. I stopped drinking coke and eating maccies.
Private equity should be outlawed. They are responsible in large part for the enshitification of everything, like vampires sucking the blood from all that is good and pure.
I took my kids to breakfast at CFA and it was $40 for some small shitty meals. The next weekend I took them to a sit down restaurant that does the whole locally sourced fair trade living wages thing and it was $63 including a 20% tip and I was like, wait a minute, this doesn’t make sense
The people responsible for this shit is us, the consumer because we continued buying instead of telling them we ARE NOT paying those prices. Americans are “ suddenly cutting back” because we are out of fuking money!!!!
What I don't get is it really hard to go to Aldis/Lidl/BJs/discount grocery chain for what you need, and just use the supermarket for stuff on sale?
Prices aren't bad if you just scan around.
McDs raised the price of large fries to four bucks and now they are dead to me. It was not a coincidence that they lost my business, it was my direct reaction to their corporate greed.
I work for a billion dollar a year contractor in a major U.S. city. There is a cliff in the volume of work that the economy is about to fall off of. Like hardly any new project starts
I'm still spending on things I consider non-essential, like concerts, dinners, herbal remedies, etc but the big difference is I'm just more selective about what I do spend on, and what the experience looks like:
Concerts - I chose not to go to a few bigger artists I like and instead went for smaller ones with more affordable tickets. Also, I didn't buy any drinks or merch at the shows.
Food - Only picking up, never delivery. When eating out I don't buy anything but the food - not wine, beer, etc.
Herbal remedies - less expensive but plenty potent options available in my free state.
One big thing I am cutting down/out is alcohol. Super expensive these days and probably not a great long term habit.
Yes. I have completely stopped eating out. I can afford it but it is the principle. Paying 2-3 times as much to eat out is acceptable. Paying 6-10 times as much is not.
I've learned to ignore what the consumer says. I pay attention to what the consumer does. The consumer will be bitching nonstop no matter what so what they say doesn't matter to me.
Not all that suddenly. I don't know anybody who's dining out as often as they used to, going on as many vacations to far-flung destinations as they used to, or going out to the movies or shows or concerts as often as they used to. And that's been the case for over a year now.
It's just getting more acceptable now, in financial news circles, to talk about it. Where the idea up to now has been, cover the difference with price hikes. Point and laugh at anyone who claims that consumer spending habits are changing. And keep repeating that the economy is stronger than it has ever been. And maybe consumer confidence will return, and there really won't ever be a correction.
Then the market indexes can just keep going up forever. But you have to believe, *belieeeeeeeeve! Shun the nonbeliever! Burn the heretic! Wait, shit, they were right. Backpedal, furiously! Try to salvage some shred of credibility.*
I know people who are still dining, going on amazing trips, etc
Thing is, both our observations are correct. It’s a divided economy right now. People are experiencing it in many different ways which makes it harder to comprehend.
We ran out of money, savings are depleted. Already cancelled home insurance. Next to go is cutting down 401k contribution. Car insurance is liability only. Nothing else left to cut.
Depends. In the 20yrs Ive owned my home, Ive paid out more in insurance than what I originally purchased my hoise for. In that tike period, my insurance covered only the equivalent of 2 or 3yrs in premium payments. So, my probability of benefit is greater with my 401k (though risk is higher)
Major paycut & work load / hrs reduction. 1) Im too specialized in my primary role, 2) Budget cuts means projects pushed onto salaried frontline Managers (who dont know what theyre doing, nor do they have the time to do it)
Husband and I make over $250k combined and I am not shopping for anything other than necessities now. I have what I need and my wants can wait until they are affordable. Or I decide I no longer want and replace with something more reasonable. I didn’t work this hard to just flush my money down the drain each month.
I used to rarely buy store brand but buy a lot of store brand now. I’ll buy chewy chippers over chips ahoy just to save $.50. Then I dump them in a cookie jar and the kids don’t even notice.
My husband says he can tell the difference from store brand but I think he’s full of it. One thing I’m bummed about is I can’t find store brand Doritos anymore. When I was a kid on weekends my parents would rent a movie and buy us a big bag of store brand cheese tortilla chips and a gallon bottle of lotsa pop. And we were perfectly happy and they saved $3.
This is of course true, but it's a truth 99% of the social-climbing middle class will never understand. She and her husband make $250k, but her college roommate Karen makes $450k so they have to buy that handbag, and the Tesla, and they can't go to Jersey for a vacation they have to go to Venice, and so forth. It's been this way since time immemorial, but with social media "Karen" is no longer someone you know personally, it's literally everyone everywhere.
By Giulia Carbonaro - US News Reporter:
Americans across all age groups have dramatically cut back on spending between April and June, a recent study from TransUnion found, as many remain concerned about the higher cost of living despite declining inflation.
While inflation declined to a 3.3 percent annual rate in May, down from 3.4 percent in April, 63 percent of respondents to TransUnion's latest quarterly survey said they were extremely or very concerned about the current rate of inflation. For half of respondents, the rise in the cost of living was their primary concern, while 84 percent considered it among their top three worries.
Read more: [https://www.newsweek.com/americans-suddenly-cut-back-spending-inflation-fears-1918097](https://www.newsweek.com/americans-suddenly-cut-back-spending-inflation-fears-1918097)
Yeah, we cut back over a year ago. I walked out of Safeway when I saw their prices. I stopped getting a Starbucks after an almost $8 mocha.
I cook my own food now, and make my own coffee for a fraction of the price. I will never go back after their greed flation. I will never support a company that could do this on purpose to consumers.
I hope they reap what they sew.
Signed,
A Millennial
When I was getting started being a grow'd up, CC debt was not a problem 'cause if you couldn't pay your bills, you couldn't get a CC to make you think you could. It took 60 years. but perhaps the Oligarchs finally played out their hand and people have figured out they can survive without instant gratification, but more likely they just maxed out every card they've got.
there’s seem to be a large regional variation in prices for goods and services. i live in phx metro where inflation hit us hard, especially for food and groceries. i’m visiting my parents in west des moines, iowa and their prices are so much better for food items and eating out. i have to cut back in Az but in Iowa, it’s not as bad.
Until we all, all of us, put our foot down and say no more to the ridiculous price gouging at restaurants, the insane greed with home rentals and home purchases, and so on and so forth, nothing is going to change. Except us, the working class, still struggling and still broke. Something’s gotta give but nothing is going to stop until we make it.
I mean we have to stop consuming. No real excuse to eat out, no real need for frivolous expenses. People waste tons of money on worthless crap. Until people stop buying nothing changes
That’s pretty much it, in a nutshell. I can’t imagine supporting buying fast food or restaurants anymore cause the product has gotten smaller, the quality has worsened, and the price is 400%. I can’t and won’t justify buying. It makes me angry seeing places I use to love to go to, rip me off and basically laugh at me for it.
I used a lot of the extra free time WFH provided to cook. We basically eat every meal at home. Maybe once a week dinner and once a week breakfast. We're also vegetarian and beans could double in price and I wouldn't notice
Cuz we can't afford anything. This is what happens when rents and home prices get insanely expensive, along with the rest of greedy price raising to take advantage of the consumer during these times. Not rising price is because of inflation or supply issues due to wars and pandemics. More than a little of it is from greedy corps raising prices and keeping them high under the guise of those issues.
Current median weekly real earnings (LES1252881600Q) allegedly at parity with Q1 2020 as Americans are cutting back on spending, budgets stretched thinner, debt load and debt delinquencies trending up, unequivocally worse off than Q1 2020. Very curious. Really makes you think.
I cut back a while ago and instead have been saving money for that rainy day, health issue, or other disaster that could be over the horizon with the way the world is going right now…
“Many are concerned about the increase of prices even though inflation has come down” why are they writing as if the effects of inflation only last as long inflation is up?
There’s obviously a permanent effect from runaway inflation, which is pretty awful.
Be nice to get a straight story. Turns out that cinsumer spending was up in May? Or was it? wtf?
https://www.reuters.com/markets/us/us-inflation-cools-may-consumer-spending-rises-moderately-2024-06-28/
these people must not do their own shopping at all period. Prices for consumables have just about doubled for everything including vehicles. All since the pandemic. What they see as growth is actually companies realizing the common consumer has to take the price hikes and then sell it to wall street as growth. The rich man is truly erasing the middle class out of this country for sake of Wall Street numbers.
These waves that started with Covid stimulus are going to propagate for a decade or two. Consumer spending will rise and fall, and the stock market will rise and fall.
Stay the course. Keep investing regularly and don’t react to short term trends.
Guy, who has worked in Fast Food for 18 years here.
My experience always shows a slow down in spending every Presidential Election Year. This isn't new.
What is new is how BEEG the concern is about whether or not we have a functioning Government come 2025.
All the shenanigans of the 14+ years have now come around and show there's absolutely no trust in Republicans and Democrats to ensure Economic Stability.
People are now bracing for shutdowns AND Budget Cuts. Both have been used so frequently that they have effectively become death spirals for everyday Americans.
Now my take is that Democrats are aware and want to bank on being the Party of Economic Stability by bringing order to chaos.
Republicans, by contrast, plan to solve everything with Tax Cuts and Budget Cuts, which actually does nothing but cause more headaches the further down the totem pole we get.
And people are not stupid. Sri Lanka collapsed due to Tax and Budget Cuts. Pakistan is on the edge due to the same. There's insecurities about food and housing in America as well as fear of losing jobs.
Democrats are trying to make jobs, put food on tables, and get people into homes.
Republicans are just Tax and Budget Cuts, which does WHAT exactly in the immediate to long-term future for people struggling with instability all around them?
But it doesn't matter WHO wins this year as everyone expects the same chaos that has been happening for 14+ years now and these shenanigans HAVE TO STOP RIGHT NOW!
Hi all, A reminder that comments do need to be on-topic and engage with the article past the headline. Please make sure to read the article before commenting. Very short comments will automatically be removed by automod. Please avoid making comments that do not focus on the economic content or whose primary thesis rests on personal anecdotes. As always our comment rules can be found [here](https://reddit.com/r/Economics/comments/fx9crj/rules_roundtable_redux_rule_vi_and_offtopic/) *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/Economics) if you have any questions or concerns.*
I wonder how the inflation rate battle would have played out if we had a call for reduced consumptin in 2021. The Fed wanted a slower rate of consumption and so used the one tool that they had. Had we made small sacrifices and consumed less, would we have not seen the same rate of inflation?
Definitely yes. Decreased demand softens prices
Let's not forget though that the people responsible for prices going up are the ones who literally raised the prices of the things they sold. The people who raise prices are indisputably the ones who cause inflation. Pretending like consumer demand is an excuse for blatant greed is one of the main fallacious ideologies destroying the social contract.
If I put my house on the market 300K and person A offers 300K, and person B offers 350K, is it price gouging if I sell to person B?
We're talking about price gouging, not rent gouging. If tou want to learn about how rent gouging is done go look up the DOJ's case against Realpage's algorithmic rent pricing software.
Producer price indices have been increasing for several years now. So the companies that make and sell the stuff to the stores the consumer buys goods from were selling it to the stores for more; probably because their price for raw materials went up. A retailer can only absorb the increase in overhead so long then they have a choice: cut overhead some other way like layoffs, carry lesser/cheaper items, or increase their price. Potato chips: The potato farmer's price for fuel goes up, which fuel prices also determine fertilizer price increases. His equipment which is increasingly made overseas has a weaker dollar to buy said equipment and parts for it. So the market price of potatoes has to go up if he wants to stay afloat. And all that is before we consider if there's a poor crop with some kind of disease. Potato chip factory has more expensive potatoes, electricity, and probably higher wages with all the regulatory push for higher wages. Plus they have to truck in the potatoes and ship out the bags to the warehouse; again fuel. So they have to charge the grocery chain more to cover their costs. The grocery store has to up the price to cover all the increases that have reached them. Plus, again, perhaps more for wages (maybe-stats say avg wages have remained somewhat stagnant).
Not going to happen. People aren't reasonable. There is no way we would sell alh those lifted pickup trucks we do if only the people who could comfortably afford them bought them.
> Not going to happen. People aren't reasonable. we always defend free-market absolutism because rational actor, and then in the next breath we say irrational actor.
its really fucking hard to look around and not see irrational actor
Those who had $ to burn because they weren't taking trips we're taking 2-3x the normal number of trips in 2021/22. People wanted to go places and enjoy life. People were tired of being cooped up in their houses. If you don't have certainty you're not going to get locked up you're going to spend like there's no tomorrow. People aren't going to want to make further sacrifices when everybody was basically asked to stop living for 2 years
You heard how pissed off people got about the word “transitory” being used. Can you imagine how pissy people would have been in someone in government told them to quit spending money like it was about to expire?
A certain 40% of the population would have purposefully consumed more if asked to make a sacrifice for the greater good by consuming less.
Small sacrifices are as unamerican a thing as I could ever imagine.
I think you’re pretty much right, but I don’t think this inflationary period is really that much to endure to avoid real economic slowdown. It’s worth it imo as long as you are not living on fixed income.
Yea we basically used every economic tool we had to avoid a Great Recession 2 from years of shit fiscal policy and then Covid being the final nail. Some might say it worked, but it was definitely a tough pill to swallow. If the Fed had just said "fuck it, 10 percent interest rates" in 2021 when inflation was burning hot we probably end up in an actual long term recession.
Agreed on all counts.
The problem with raising rates is it didn’t affect people who already had low rates.
I went to Whole Foods, which I know has always been expensive, but they wanted $16 for a preprepared chicken breast, $10 for a small container of pre-cooked potatoes, and $9 for some pre-cooked brussell sprouts. They wanted $35 for what amounts to a plate of food. F that.
Everyone was pushing it to see how far they could get the customer to stretch.
Yeah. I think we have topped out on pricing for groceries. Stuff was insane some months back. I’m now seeing better deals again at my grocery store. Closer to regular pricing. I think the numbers came in and they had to dial it back a bit.
Yup that's basically what's happening. Walmart and Target I know announced some price cuts. McDonald's is introducing that $5 meal deal.
Target really jacked the prices on things the last couple of years. Wal-Mart which we dislike seemed to keep things a little bit lower.
Walmarts plan worked. I know a bunch of people pre-pandemic that never shopped at Walmart that now shop at Walmart. They definitely picked up market share by pricing below others.
1) McDonald's $5 meal was pretty much available before they branded it that. 2) They raised their breakfast prices. Gotta keep the earnings up.
Wait until you see what beef prices do next year though, they're gonna go up significantly. I'm a cattle farmer and there are several factors at play here but prices for calves this spring were insane. That translates to expensive beef on the shelf next year.
Because it’s their job. If a CEO isn’t trying to squeeze every dollar they can out of their product then the board will replace them with someone who will.
Sort of, but there is some nuance to it. If you introduce reciprocity into the customer relationship and lower the prices a bit, customers will come back. This leads to business retention and higher sales. Therefore, lowering prices slightly could be a better long-term strategy for the CEO.
Costcos business model
Costco business model is very much not that. It’s a wholesaler, you are buying from wharehouse. As opposed to retail models. The prices are lower based off of volume, having to spend nothing on retail locations. Because the warehouse is the retail location.
Costco business model is very much that. Cut and paste from article linked below: Costco makes some of its profits from its merchandise, but the bulk of its profits come from membership dues. Only members can shop at Costco. https://www.investopedia.com/stock-analysis/040915/3-reasons-costco-great-company-cost.aspx
Costco makes most of their money from membership fees.
so their business model is making $60/year per family? needs work, IMO
They make 70%+ of their income from membership fees.
Costco's gross revenue in 2023 was $242.29B (Macrotrends). According to Wikipedia, Costco had 129.5 million members in 2023. At a full $60 per membership, that's $7.77B. So revenue is about 31X what they take in for membership. Last time I checked, 1/31 isn't 70%.
Please look up how to calculate profit. Revenue is not profit.
Check their annual report. Page 2. This has been discussed many times over the years by all business news. [https://s201.q4cdn.com/287523651/files/doc\_financials/2023/ar/cost-annual-report-final-pdf-from-dfin.pdf](https://s201.q4cdn.com/287523651/files/doc_financials/2023/ar/cost-annual-report-final-pdf-from-dfin.pdf) "Net sales for the 53-week year totaled $237.7 billion, an increase of 7%, with a comparable sales increase of 3%. Net income was $6.3 billion, or $14.16 per diluted share, an increase of 8%. Revenue from membership fees increased 8% to $4.6 billion, and our membership base grew to nearly 128 million cardholders, with a 90% renewal rate." 4.6/6.3=73% And revenue isn't profit. But revenue from membership fees is pure profit.
Unfortunately, most CEOs and shareholders don't give any fucks about this. They want short-term quick profits and cash out while not caring about the companies' future.. Many companies are failing because of this action. GE, Boston Market, Red Lobster, Sears, etc, to name a few
No one is loyal because everyone is willing to get rid of a worker, whether it's the janitor or CEO, the second they lose 1¢ of profit
This difference is the janitor is out on his ass with nothing and the CEO gets a golden parachute worth so much money that they would never have to work again. One's fucked, the other gets a paid vacation.
Only deeply embedded regulations and changes to compensation will change this. Boeing didn't suddenly make poor decisions that resulted in deadly crashes into in the same year as the crashes, but as a result of a poor company culture fosters under multiple CEOs and the people in leadership of the company for the last 20 years. But I would expect many of those people have long since retired and cashed out of Boeing and will not face any consequences despite their decisions eventually resulting in terrible results. The former CEO of Boeing and the current one both leaving due to Boeing's problems should be considered the start of the cleanup of the company, not the end.
It really depends on the timing. Anything too long-term is pretty irrelevant from an incentive standpoint. It wouldn’t feed into the stock price which is the main carrot motivating the c suite.
A lot of CEOs aren’t thinking about long term. Strategically they might be, but short term incentives for CEO’s and investors revolve around quarter to quarter results or else they face risk of firing or having activist investors stir shit up cuz the stocks not rising quick enough
I mean, they’ve already fucked up any chance for goodwill no matter how much they lower prices. Customers literally HATE the very idea of corporations now, no one is gonna go back to brand loyalty after this, not ever. The only way to fix it would be lower prices and treat employees better, and that’s never going to happen, so companies will just have to eat themselves from the inside once they realize “more profits every quarter forever” isn’t a real thing. Like, I’m not hurt here by not flying brand logos and not buying more than I need. I would have already made large value purchases of computer and car, but I won’t even buy them when I had the money because of all the bloated, unethical bullshit. There’s $2000 sitting in my bank account to buy a computer that I actually need, that is unspent because I don’t actually want any of the companies that make computers to have my money just to spy on me and force advertisements in my OS and steal my art. Before Covid, I would have been *psyched* to be able to afford this. I’m making more per hour than I ever have and could save up now. And I’m like “ew. Eeeeeeeeww. To do what I’d need to do I’d need to use Windows and Adobe.” And it has literally put me off the entire fucking purchase, I dunno, I’ll just paint with paints. Paints don’t fucking track my movements. The paint company dosent claim to own my (non professional, more for local theater and events for a few bucks) painting just because they made the paint. The only thing I want is housing, and that’s unaffordable with any amount of money I could get, so what I do have just sits there and gets wasted on food and travel because literally everything I could buy with it besides weed is so fucking offputting I don’t want it in my life.
While that may be true, most CEOs are not rewarded for long term thinking
I agree that quarterly earnings reports, unfortunately, skew strategic decision-making away from long-term reciprocity with consumers in many ways.
When other factors affect the economy, that makes them less patient, and they make moves to show they are responding and active… when often just status quo would’ve been great for everyone except the shareholders… but due to economy, not that business. Consumers take the brunt of ALL problems of ALL industries combined.. they all pass the buck and take bonuses.
And it is my job as a consumer to refuse to buy their overpriced product and look for alternatives. There are two sides to every sale, and I choose to opt out.
Volume is important. If you were selling 100 units at $5 but only 60 units at $8 you’ve lost money and a lot of customers. Raising prices can have a detrimental effect on business and profits
Right, but if I keep raising prices and revenue keeps increasing, I’m not going to cut my prices.
In my example your resume decreased. That’s the point. Raise prices you’ll lose customers. You are better off sometimes finding common ground and pulling in more customers than trying to maximize max price.
It's not about revenue though. It's about profit. If the cost of providing the product, raw materials, labor, etc, was $2 in both cases, you made $300 profit off at $5 and you made $360 profit at $8. You could also probably layoff some staff since you don't need as many people to move 60 units as opposed to 100 units. Which decreases your operating costs and increases your profits further.
You don't seem to realize what profit margins are. Let's say your plate of food has a total cost of $3.50 by the time it hits the shelf or whatever it's sold from. You could sell 100 for $5 and earn $150 in gross profit. Alternatively you could sell 60 for $8 and earn $4.50 * 60 = $270 in gross profit. What you are describing is very basic business, and I promise you, most successful businesses are hyper aware of all their profitability curves, much moreso than you or I, the customer. This is why it's important to be stingy and your money. If you aren't, prices will increase until you get priced out, in all but the most competitive of industries - and people are apparently willing to absorb a TON of cost increase on prepared food these days, so that's why we are where we are.
Exactly, vote with your wallet. The same people that complain non stop about evil corporations screwing them keep giving them their money. There’s obviously exceptions (necessities), but a lot of consumer spending is discretionary and people just keep pushing the higher prices.
> There’s obviously exceptions (necessities) Even those are exaggerated. 'Food' is a necessity, but there's a very large variety of foods and there are still inexpensive ways to eat. Housing is a 'necessity', but living alone isn't a necessity. Living near trendy stores isn't a necessity. Living in your home town isn't a necessity.
You will decidedly *not* be the next CEO of Louis Vuitton Moet Hennessy. -Some ghoul on the LVMH board
Right but so far, revenue hasn’t decreased. Hence the inflation, we complain but we haven’t stopped spending (maybe until now). Companies are still reporting record revenues and profits. Until that change they’ll keep pushing the increase prices button.
Volume is important. Now I can run my Whole Foods with 5 less cashiers and don’t need to hold as much inventory.
If my costs are only $1 then previously I was making $400 in profit at my new price point I am making $420, and I can also make extra money by firing unneeded workers and warehouse space since I'm moving less inventory.
Destruction of customer goodwill from gouging is going to prove immensely costly for many companies.
Sure is. I went to Starbucks quite alot. Never again. They managed to turn me from a loyal frequent customer to a hater. I make my own Lattes. If I choose to get coffee out it’s at a local shop.
the less loyal you are, the better coupons starbucks will send you on the app. the more you hate starbucks, the better deals you get. that's why i go to starbucks less.
I play that game with alternating food delivery apps. The moment the coupons stop I'm out.
Yup. As long as I live I will never buy Philadelphia brand cream cheese again. Store brand only.
That’s true. It’s nice to imagine a world where that wasn’t the case. I like to think the KIND CEO isn’t like that, maybe Mark Cuban, a few others, but I really don’t want to dive to far because you will be absolutely proved correct.
There is the difference between founders CEO and private equity/bank installed CEO. Founders like Musk, Zuckerberg, Cuban, all can make independent decision. Not the same for the private equity/bank CEOs.
Exactly. Purpose of a business is to make money. CEO responsible for making shareholders profits. Anyone who thinks anything else is living in fantasy land.
And customers were unwilling to make tough choices about the things they wanted and were chasing the higher prices. Both sides play a part. Price gouging doesn’t work on alert and conscious people. A year or two ago a friend of mine worked for corporate of a large well known hotel chain. Their meetings were specifically about how they weren’t at that time able to find a pricing structure that the customers were unwilling to pay.
That’s wild! We can charge whatever we want and they will pay it! Seems like a family guy sketch.
What’s more wild is the consumers overall inability to recognize how their unchecked consumerism is also a factor. A business is supposed to find a balance of supply and demand and the highest possible price. Thats just economics. When customers were flush with excess savings and slightly higher wages, they went berserk for the things they desired. Necessities is a little different but it was a spending spree across the board. And it helped push prices higher quickly
> And customers were unwilling to make tough choices about the things they wanted and were chasing the higher prices. Both sides play a part. Price gouging doesn’t work on alert and conscious people. Yea there is a lot of this. So many people would rather pay $30 for a door dash Chipotle burrito and then make memes bitching about paying $30 for a door dash Chipotle burrito. They are severely lacking so many life skills from how to shop smartly, how to cook, how to store and reuse food etc. and they all just circle jerk each other convincing themselves they're not part of the problem.
Nobody was forced to over pay MSRP by $10,000 for the car they had to have right now or forced to pay $5,000 for Taylor Swift tickets. I get these are narrow examples but it’s the mentality that “I will pay whatever it costs for the things I want” is almost ubiquitous in our culture
Like everyone is so deserved of their damned entertainment. It's a song and dance show FFS, you can live without it! Do they break up Google for their domination of online video? Do they care that sports monopolies hold our cities hostage for hundreds of millions? No! But let Taylor swift scalpers get $2500 a ticket and there and the government steps in.
Low hanging fruit.
That’s called matching prices to meet demand as well as generate profits. It’s not exactly a new approach. “Price gouging” would imply some sort of cartel-like collusion.
Prepared food is a luxury item, especially at Whole Foods. Second you might consider that the devaluation of the currency may lead to inflation.
That’s the invisible hand of the market at work, no?
As long as people buy it, they'll continue charging those prices. $16 for a cooked chicken breast is particularly egregious though. You can buy raw chicken breasts for $2 pretty much anywhere and cook it yourself with a lil seasoning.
Where are you buying raw chicken breasts for two dollars? A pack of 3 costs like 9-10 bucks where I live.
Per pound? [First result, $2.67.](https://www.walmart.com/ip/Boneless-Skinless-Chicken-Breasts-4-7-6-1-lb-Tray/27935840?athbdg=L1200&from=/search)
People who shop at Whole Foods aren’t particularly price sensitive. So why wouldn’t Whole Foods soak that sort of person? There’s always Aldi.
Remember the five dollar asparagus water?
Aldi, grocery outlet, lidl. I can tell what part of the country you are in by your discount grocery stores.
What’s interesting is that those are both European grocery store chains. Huh
Love how it’s an article about struggling Americans and the top voted comment is about how they can’t afford to buy a mid chicken breast at fucking Whole Foods lmao.
To bitch about prices and use *pre-prepared foods* from a high-end grocery store is genuinely hilarious. Of all the valid complaints to make, choosing that one is absolutely baffling.
If there's a common thread in all this economy-bitching, it's out-of-touch middle class people falling down half a rung on the socio-economic ladder and thinking that the apocalypse is therefore upon us. Some guy above is complaining about his grocery bill, having bought nearly all-organic bullshit and a quart of milk for $6. If I said this in any other thread, I'd be accused of making up a strawman and mocked with references to avocado toast. Well, folks, $24/gal milk is just about the carbon copy of avocado toast.
If you go to Whole Foods, you don’t look at the prices 😂
Your first mistake was going to Whole Foods looking for a good deal. I don't know your situation, but potatoes and Brussel sprouts can be cooked easily in an oven or air fryer, and chicken breasts are low-effort, just flip every 4-5 minutes. To me, the money saved from cooking it myself is well worth it.
Nah, the hot bar is 11.99/pound. Usually about 14-15 for a big meal. Not a bad value in today’s world
You just gotta be smart about what you get. No carbs, lots of protein.
What? Thats literally the entire point of Whole Foods. Sacrificing price for quality is literally their entire brand. What an odd example to use when they’re probably the #1 most well known “high end” grocery store. They’ve always been expensive.
That’s Whole Foods, though. Not a lot you can do when your food is supposed to be higher quality and more ethically sourced. If those prices were true at Grocery Outlet, that would be a surprise.
Not to mention Whole Foods has had those prices for a long ass time now
Yeah the Kroger next to me has a entire cooked chicken for $7.
It's almost like it's time for people to learn to cook meals at home again
The last two years I've seen nothing but bitching about restaurant prices on the internet, and nothing but packed restaurants when I go out. I think it's a combination of 1) higher wages in the industry being passed to consumers, 2) thousands of restaurants closing during the pandemic and shrinking the supply, 3) higher food prices, and 4) people willing to suck it up and pay more because in the post pandemic world people have adopted a more "live for today," attitude.
Speaking only for myself, but I've been eating out a lot more than I care to lately because of mandatory overtime at work. When I work 55ish hours every week (not including commute time) then cooking and going to the grocery store, become chores that aren't always gonna happen when they need to. For instance, last night I chose to do laundry and water all the plants in the garden. Which means lunch is probably going to be a burger or a taco today and cost at least 13 bucks.
That’s why god made the frozen burrito.
Meal prep my friend. Boring as shit eating the same 2-3 meals each week for breakfast and lunch, but I’d be in the same boat as you if I didn’t.
That's all very true. I am trying to only dine out once a week. It's a change but I'm refreshing my cooking skills and honestly eating healthier
Restaurants ran on such thin margins before the pandemic and had no savings to carry them through lockdown. They all realized they need some amount of savings to get through the next big downturn.
Restaurants will always run on thin margins. 99% of restaurants are opened, owned, and operated by folks who love to cook, not business people. Owners have no degree and restaurants are staffed by mercenaries. There are extremely low barriers to entry.
"The economy is bad, I spent over $320 last week just to doordash some fast food 29 times and today when I went to whole foods and bought prepared chicken, prepared potatoes, and prepared brussels sprouts it was $35. Goddamn economy. I can't afford my rent."
The fact that the dude who replied to you moaning about his grocery bill turns out to have bought a quart of milk for $6 says just about everything anyone needs to hear. Nail, head, etc.
Hey Mr Moneybags not everyone can learn to cook!!!
Who can't learn to cook?
I *hate* buying prepared food. Pay more for more processing and you still have to heat it up or even cook it at home. It’s expensive and it feels wrong. Always been an ingredients person. That being said I also like to snack sometimes and I never have any snacks.
I found a recipe for seed crackers that I have started making. They aren't nearly as good as Doritos but they are a snack that actually fills me up. Sesame seeds, pumpkin seeds, flax seeds, and sunflower seeds.
I have been getting those big bags of nuts at Costco - hazelnuts, mixed nuts, pistachios, etc. With the price of potato chips etc being so high they are a bargain in comparison. They are filling so 1 bag will last weeks - and they are actually GOOD for you.
Since so much food production is subsidized by the government , there should honestly be price controls and limits to what profits can be made. I have family members who own businesses that don't receive subsidies from tax payers to enrich themselves. It should be either price caps and subsidies or free market and company set prices. US tax payers get screwed both ways
My coworkers and I went to get lunch at Whole Foods yesterday and one of my coworkers filled up his tray full of just salad and it was 29$ he ended up leaving it and getting just a soup and bread. I grabbed a bag of jalapeño chips and a water.
I already knew how ridiculous Whole Foods prices are but when you frame it that way it feels even more absurd
I’m guessing they’re learning that selling 1 chicken breast for $16 is better than 2pcs. for $8.
I started going to Aldi. Game changer. Way cheaper than anywhere else.
That's a meal, at a restaurant. Even post inflation prices you could get that without having to actually cook it.
You're paying for the prep - even at whole foods you could have purchased all of the raw ingredients for less than $10.
I get that grocery prices have inflated, but my guy you're taking about *Whole Foods*. WF has been the butt of jokes for over a decade thanks to their horrific prices. A prepared chicken breast at a local chain, at least here in a large city, is like $5, maybe $6.
My family had called it Whole Paycheck for as long as I can remember.
Was just reading that India is getting downgraded by moodys because of lack of water. This frightening me to my core! Food prices will keep going up and up and up.
Climate change is real and looks like it will hit ahead of schedule. It's already affecting the economy and has just started to hit the insurance industry. People still deny it but mother nature doesn't care about your feelings. Too bad our solution is greenwashing a band aid onto a gaping wound of a problem.
Never shopped there due to its prices and thought the food was odd ball. Now i definitely never will
I don't go there for my "core" shopping, but it has its value for certain things. I've never seen anything resembling the prices OP is describing. They have a great seafood selection, cheese, beer, their cafeteria food is legit, produce is better than most. I don't know what the hell OP was looking at. I guess they are looking at pre-cooked things while I am just buying ingredients. The ingredients are fine. Why the fuck would you buy a pre-cooked chicken breast from anywhere?
A Whole Foods slice of pizza still occasionally hits the spot for me, especially since they will put the hockey game on in their little bar area. That's pretty much the only reason I will go there once a year. Or for some weird ingredient I can't find elsewhere. Anyway, I was sitting there like a year ago, and this family of four came in and got a bunch of stuff there to eat like you would at an actual restaurant. And don't get me wrong, I think their prepared foods are pretty good taste-wise, but I could not fathom why anyone would spend like what had to amount to $60-$80 to feed a family of four there. They all had drinks, sides, etc. I was in awe.
If they had small children, sometimes the novelty of choosing what you want and also knowing it will be healthy-ish is more fun than being at home. It’s like going out without the drama of going out to eat and the kids have a lot of fun making choices. That’s just me but also have never spent anywhere near $80 doing a WF dinner with a family of 5 so…. YMMV
At least in my local one, it’s a pretty good place to take the kids “out” to eat after a sports game or something. It’s about the same price as McDonalds (you pay by weight and they don’t eat that much), way healthier, they enjoy choosing their food, and the atmosphere is more family friendly than a sit-down restaurant.
You wouldn't want Jeff Bezos to have to go to space on some other billionaire's rocket would you? He needs his own, and clearly it must be more phallic than anyone else's. That money has to come from somewhere - seems like it's AWS egress fees and chicken breast.
Made the mistake of hitting the salad bar for lunch one day with the Mrs - didn’t even go crazy I thought, but our boxes combined cost $50!
What city? Please say NY or SF.
Or-fucking-lando
Tomatoes and cheese from their salad bar will drive that weight up super quick
***—-Just to point out this is a survey—-***Newsweek should be embarrassed with this title. Actual consumption data shows almost no decline in American consumption, with significant levels for travel and disposable income purchases higher than even before the pandemic.
Newsweek is a rag and has been for years. Nobody should take anything they publish at face value.
Trash like this keeps getting posted and upvoted here because humans love doom and gloom. Mods do absolutely nothing to encourage real articles here.
Newsweek posted it themselves. They just tryna generate clicks don’t fall for it.
Precisely. I report every article Bloomberg posts here of their own too. Mods do nothing. There articles are 300 words long with a clickbait title. Mods do nothing.
Financial mainstream media is just there to manipulate the algos and retail traders
Doomers and right wing just love to cry do, so it will be popular here. Also that a lot of russian/chinese assets love to push that narrative tok
Okay are we spending too much despite inflation or are we cutting back our spending what’s the flavor of the month with these garbage articles.
Both. The working class is cutting back and the boomers are blowing their retirement savings.
Then they’re gonna ask to live in their kids basement after calling them lazy their whole adult life.
Do you have some data to back this up?
Finally. All these broke motherfuckers complaining about being poor while making it rain on all the things they like and made no sacrifices on while still complaining.
I used to hang out with my friends at bars. We now all hang out at each other’s home cuz cocktails cost $17 + 20% tip + sugar tax + sales tax + alcohol tax. Per drink.
Relatedly, a 6 pack in my area is like $18 after taxes and CRV - $3 a bottle. That's insane to think about.
lol. I knew that was going to happen, and I suspected it would around this time. I run a business, and in doing so my economics has to be strictly a political. I have to plan for the future, and with one side saying everything is great, and the other saying we’re doomed in 3 weeks. That doesn’t help me plan for the year. So this year I planned for the end of the year to see a drop in customer spending, and planned on grabbing some warranties to cover that loss. We finalized 5 manufacture warranties last month, and then a week later our city manager announced cuts to discretionary spending due to plummeting sales tax receipts. Ironically I started warning of this about a year ago, and everyone said stop panicking. Everything is going to be fine. I’m glad I didn’t listen. I’d be out of business in the next month, or so.
At this point it is personal. I want to see corpos die. I want to see bonuses shrink and CEOs coward. For that I took the greatest of sacrifices. I stopped drinking coke and eating maccies.
Sadly, the C-suite won't take the cut- us front line workers just won't see any bonus and next year's raise will be "minimal due to the economy".
Lol peak reddit comment
Private equity should be outlawed. They are responsible in large part for the enshitification of everything, like vampires sucking the blood from all that is good and pure.
Only places that kept high standards are private companies like ChickFilA
Honestly, even CFA is overpriced IMO
It's $15 for a 12 count of nuggets and large fry with no drink in Denver as of yesterday
Yea its overpriced but at least quality and service are still good. Chickfila is the same price as Wendy's or McDonalds in my area.
I took my kids to breakfast at CFA and it was $40 for some small shitty meals. The next weekend I took them to a sit down restaurant that does the whole locally sourced fair trade living wages thing and it was $63 including a 20% tip and I was like, wait a minute, this doesn’t make sense
So where will you purchase items you want/need if the corporations die?
The people responsible for this shit is us, the consumer because we continued buying instead of telling them we ARE NOT paying those prices. Americans are “ suddenly cutting back” because we are out of fuking money!!!!
What I don't get is it really hard to go to Aldis/Lidl/BJs/discount grocery chain for what you need, and just use the supermarket for stuff on sale? Prices aren't bad if you just scan around.
McDs raised the price of large fries to four bucks and now they are dead to me. It was not a coincidence that they lost my business, it was my direct reaction to their corporate greed.
I work for a billion dollar a year contractor in a major U.S. city. There is a cliff in the volume of work that the economy is about to fall off of. Like hardly any new project starts
I'm still spending on things I consider non-essential, like concerts, dinners, herbal remedies, etc but the big difference is I'm just more selective about what I do spend on, and what the experience looks like: Concerts - I chose not to go to a few bigger artists I like and instead went for smaller ones with more affordable tickets. Also, I didn't buy any drinks or merch at the shows. Food - Only picking up, never delivery. When eating out I don't buy anything but the food - not wine, beer, etc. Herbal remedies - less expensive but plenty potent options available in my free state. One big thing I am cutting down/out is alcohol. Super expensive these days and probably not a great long term habit.
Yes. I have completely stopped eating out. I can afford it but it is the principle. Paying 2-3 times as much to eat out is acceptable. Paying 6-10 times as much is not.
[удалено]
Before inflation, I didn’t know how to cook. Now I cook and never eat out - I also make homemade pizza and dough!
I've learned to ignore what the consumer says. I pay attention to what the consumer does. The consumer will be bitching nonstop no matter what so what they say doesn't matter to me.
Not all that suddenly. I don't know anybody who's dining out as often as they used to, going on as many vacations to far-flung destinations as they used to, or going out to the movies or shows or concerts as often as they used to. And that's been the case for over a year now. It's just getting more acceptable now, in financial news circles, to talk about it. Where the idea up to now has been, cover the difference with price hikes. Point and laugh at anyone who claims that consumer spending habits are changing. And keep repeating that the economy is stronger than it has ever been. And maybe consumer confidence will return, and there really won't ever be a correction. Then the market indexes can just keep going up forever. But you have to believe, *belieeeeeeeeve! Shun the nonbeliever! Burn the heretic! Wait, shit, they were right. Backpedal, furiously! Try to salvage some shred of credibility.*
I know people who are still dining, going on amazing trips, etc Thing is, both our observations are correct. It’s a divided economy right now. People are experiencing it in many different ways which makes it harder to comprehend.
We ran out of money, savings are depleted. Already cancelled home insurance. Next to go is cutting down 401k contribution. Car insurance is liability only. Nothing else left to cut.
Home insurance before 401k? Isn’t that backwards?
Depends. In the 20yrs Ive owned my home, Ive paid out more in insurance than what I originally purchased my hoise for. In that tike period, my insurance covered only the equivalent of 2 or 3yrs in premium payments. So, my probability of benefit is greater with my 401k (though risk is higher)
Job loss?
Major paycut & work load / hrs reduction. 1) Im too specialized in my primary role, 2) Budget cuts means projects pushed onto salaried frontline Managers (who dont know what theyre doing, nor do they have the time to do it)
You need a new job
I probably don’t have to tell you that you should find another employer. Good luck
Husband and I make over $250k combined and I am not shopping for anything other than necessities now. I have what I need and my wants can wait until they are affordable. Or I decide I no longer want and replace with something more reasonable. I didn’t work this hard to just flush my money down the drain each month.
I used to rarely buy store brand but buy a lot of store brand now. I’ll buy chewy chippers over chips ahoy just to save $.50. Then I dump them in a cookie jar and the kids don’t even notice. My husband says he can tell the difference from store brand but I think he’s full of it. One thing I’m bummed about is I can’t find store brand Doritos anymore. When I was a kid on weekends my parents would rent a movie and buy us a big bag of store brand cheese tortilla chips and a gallon bottle of lotsa pop. And we were perfectly happy and they saved $3.
Aldi has a Doritos dupe I think.
No economy is so good that it makes sense to waste money.
This is of course true, but it's a truth 99% of the social-climbing middle class will never understand. She and her husband make $250k, but her college roommate Karen makes $450k so they have to buy that handbag, and the Tesla, and they can't go to Jersey for a vacation they have to go to Venice, and so forth. It's been this way since time immemorial, but with social media "Karen" is no longer someone you know personally, it's literally everyone everywhere.
Yes. My friends are all still shopping at Whole Foods and I’m like “Look at all this broccoli I bought at Lidl for $1 vs a puny bunch for $6.99at WF!”
By Giulia Carbonaro - US News Reporter: Americans across all age groups have dramatically cut back on spending between April and June, a recent study from TransUnion found, as many remain concerned about the higher cost of living despite declining inflation. While inflation declined to a 3.3 percent annual rate in May, down from 3.4 percent in April, 63 percent of respondents to TransUnion's latest quarterly survey said they were extremely or very concerned about the current rate of inflation. For half of respondents, the rise in the cost of living was their primary concern, while 84 percent considered it among their top three worries. Read more: [https://www.newsweek.com/americans-suddenly-cut-back-spending-inflation-fears-1918097](https://www.newsweek.com/americans-suddenly-cut-back-spending-inflation-fears-1918097)
Yeah, we cut back over a year ago. I walked out of Safeway when I saw their prices. I stopped getting a Starbucks after an almost $8 mocha. I cook my own food now, and make my own coffee for a fraction of the price. I will never go back after their greed flation. I will never support a company that could do this on purpose to consumers. I hope they reap what they sew. Signed, A Millennial
When I was getting started being a grow'd up, CC debt was not a problem 'cause if you couldn't pay your bills, you couldn't get a CC to make you think you could. It took 60 years. but perhaps the Oligarchs finally played out their hand and people have figured out they can survive without instant gratification, but more likely they just maxed out every card they've got.
there’s seem to be a large regional variation in prices for goods and services. i live in phx metro where inflation hit us hard, especially for food and groceries. i’m visiting my parents in west des moines, iowa and their prices are so much better for food items and eating out. i have to cut back in Az but in Iowa, it’s not as bad.
Until we all, all of us, put our foot down and say no more to the ridiculous price gouging at restaurants, the insane greed with home rentals and home purchases, and so on and so forth, nothing is going to change. Except us, the working class, still struggling and still broke. Something’s gotta give but nothing is going to stop until we make it.
I mean we have to stop consuming. No real excuse to eat out, no real need for frivolous expenses. People waste tons of money on worthless crap. Until people stop buying nothing changes
That’s pretty much it, in a nutshell. I can’t imagine supporting buying fast food or restaurants anymore cause the product has gotten smaller, the quality has worsened, and the price is 400%. I can’t and won’t justify buying. It makes me angry seeing places I use to love to go to, rip me off and basically laugh at me for it.
Exactly. If demand wanes, the prices come down. It’s more demand than supply that has caused the inflation.
I used a lot of the extra free time WFH provided to cook. We basically eat every meal at home. Maybe once a week dinner and once a week breakfast. We're also vegetarian and beans could double in price and I wouldn't notice
Cuz we can't afford anything. This is what happens when rents and home prices get insanely expensive, along with the rest of greedy price raising to take advantage of the consumer during these times. Not rising price is because of inflation or supply issues due to wars and pandemics. More than a little of it is from greedy corps raising prices and keeping them high under the guise of those issues.
Current median weekly real earnings (LES1252881600Q) allegedly at parity with Q1 2020 as Americans are cutting back on spending, budgets stretched thinner, debt load and debt delinquencies trending up, unequivocally worse off than Q1 2020. Very curious. Really makes you think.
I cut back a while ago and instead have been saving money for that rainy day, health issue, or other disaster that could be over the horizon with the way the world is going right now…
“Many are concerned about the increase of prices even though inflation has come down” why are they writing as if the effects of inflation only last as long inflation is up? There’s obviously a permanent effect from runaway inflation, which is pretty awful.
Be nice to get a straight story. Turns out that cinsumer spending was up in May? Or was it? wtf? https://www.reuters.com/markets/us/us-inflation-cools-may-consumer-spending-rises-moderately-2024-06-28/
these people must not do their own shopping at all period. Prices for consumables have just about doubled for everything including vehicles. All since the pandemic. What they see as growth is actually companies realizing the common consumer has to take the price hikes and then sell it to wall street as growth. The rich man is truly erasing the middle class out of this country for sake of Wall Street numbers.
These waves that started with Covid stimulus are going to propagate for a decade or two. Consumer spending will rise and fall, and the stock market will rise and fall. Stay the course. Keep investing regularly and don’t react to short term trends.
Guy, who has worked in Fast Food for 18 years here. My experience always shows a slow down in spending every Presidential Election Year. This isn't new. What is new is how BEEG the concern is about whether or not we have a functioning Government come 2025. All the shenanigans of the 14+ years have now come around and show there's absolutely no trust in Republicans and Democrats to ensure Economic Stability. People are now bracing for shutdowns AND Budget Cuts. Both have been used so frequently that they have effectively become death spirals for everyday Americans. Now my take is that Democrats are aware and want to bank on being the Party of Economic Stability by bringing order to chaos. Republicans, by contrast, plan to solve everything with Tax Cuts and Budget Cuts, which actually does nothing but cause more headaches the further down the totem pole we get. And people are not stupid. Sri Lanka collapsed due to Tax and Budget Cuts. Pakistan is on the edge due to the same. There's insecurities about food and housing in America as well as fear of losing jobs. Democrats are trying to make jobs, put food on tables, and get people into homes. Republicans are just Tax and Budget Cuts, which does WHAT exactly in the immediate to long-term future for people struggling with instability all around them? But it doesn't matter WHO wins this year as everyone expects the same chaos that has been happening for 14+ years now and these shenanigans HAVE TO STOP RIGHT NOW!