If inflation is cooling why are prices going up?

[pinkytoe]

Prices on just about everything we buy continue to escalate whether its consumer goods, food or services. Yet even after today's rate hike, we are told that inflation is finally cooling. I read that consumers especially those who can afford it just shrug and pay the price so corporations continue to raise prices or hold at high prices. More often than not, I tell DH we will have to make our own. $7 for a bag of organic corn tortilla chips? $8 for a decent loaf of bread? Nope...high prices sure are making our little household more resourceful.

[Yppej]

Its doublespeak. Supposedly the rate of increase is slowing so it's going up 8% not 10% - still going up and still crazy inflationary.

[Teacher Terry]

I am on my condo board and our vendors are really jacking up our prices. Some weren’t giving good service as it was so raising prices was the final straw. Our crappy pool company was doubling our bid to have our pool open for 110 days. We said no and got more bids. Finally took one that was 40% lower. Our management company tried to tell us it was just inflation because they didn’t want to look for another vendor. We decided we would keep the pool closed before we would be extorted.

As for my personal budget I have been finding cheaper options even though it’s taken a good chunk of time. When my groomer raised their prices 4xs in 18 months I left. Their business used to be busy and now it’s not. People have a breaking point.

[bae]

I've basically stopped buying things, because the prices are so absurd I feel like I'm being ripped off, and I can generally come up with another alternative.

Probably healthier for me too, the diet soda I buy, which was *already* overpriced since the pandemic began, went up 35% here last week. Nope.

My HOA just paved our road system ~4 years ago. We were doing some reserve planning last week, and noticed we'd only included the traditional regional inflation metric in our calculations, so we got some back-of-the-envelope bids so we could correct the model. Paving projects have skyrocketed. In order to deal with that, we are going to scale back on some of the semi-critical services we provide to the residents.

[Rogar]

I shop more often to high grade grocery sales and stockpile sale items. I really can’t tell if things are still going up or if they are at the same expensive prices as a couple of months ago. I could find work arounds for chips and breads but have my own issues. At least there’s starting to be some fresh seasonal produce coming in with reasonable prices.

[flowerseverywhere]

Quaker oats have almost doubled here. I happened to see a display of Lorna Doone cookies and they were 6.29. Apples are 2.99/ lb.

I shop sales. We almost never eat beef. I make almost everything from scratch. Produce from farmers market is our go to.

For other items I shop thrift stores and yard sales.

Luckily my passion, quilting and sewing, is mostly supplied by discards and donations from others because they know I sew a lot for charity, or sell items and donate the money to local charities that support vets and children.

I have enough not to care, however with three grandchildren approaching university age, I would like to be able to help them. Wasting money is just not in my genes.


It makes no sense.to me that prices on some these items have skyrocketed.

[catherine]

My neighbor just had her job review (she works for a large Vermont company with a national reach), and the raise was the same for everyone company-wide--2.5%. Lower than the CMS cost-of-living increase. How do you navigate the waters of inflation when you are basically going backwards with your paycheck?

[Yppej]

In my company it was 3.5% for everyone. They really do want us to "own nothing and be happy". The first will happen if we stay on the current trajectory, the second will not.

[Tradd]

I got a $10K raise last year. Not expecting anything this year.

[pinkytoe]

I get my hair trimmed about twice a year. Just a dry cut that takes about five minutes. It has always been between $15 and $18 but on my last visit, it was $30.