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UK: Food inflation rises to 18.2% as it hits highest rate in over 45 years

grocerygazette.co.uk

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Re: UK: Food inflation rises to 18.2% as it hits highest rate in over 45 years

#701

Post by amrocha »

prox wrote: post #516
louwrentius wrote: post #500

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why so convoluted. Just tax the rich (companies) properly. The resources and money is available. The current government chooses not to allocate it properly. What is happening in the UK is to me 100% the result of the current Conservative Party and their policies.

Tax the rich and they go somewhere else (see recent discussions about the wealth tax in France)

They can leave if they want, as long as they pay an exit tax. But personally I think that's bullshit, they'd rather be less rich in France than more rich in Romania.

And if you're talking about companies leaving France, then that's flimsy too. French citizens are among the richest in the world. International companies will pay higher taxes to access that market, and if they don't that's fine, a domestic company can step in or the government can snap up the productive capacity to invest in infrastructure.

Re: UK: Food inflation rises to 18.2% as it hits highest rate in over 45 years

#702

Post by TheOtherHobbes »

justsocrateasin wrote: post #420
wahnfrieden wrote: post #359

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why doesn’t 4% count as weaponized? That’s higher than typical annual raises, not to mention non workers

IIRC deflation and inflation are equally as bad. If 'inflation' rates are negative, the economy grinds to a halt. Having an inflation rate of ~2% is widely considered to be beneficially for everyone, since it's in a 'goldilocks' zone, it creates stability. Inflation of 4% sure isn't as good as 2%, but generally speaking the inflation rate in the UK appears to hover around 2-3% during "stable" periods. https://www.mac…

Curious that there's been so little financial stability in this supposedly stabilised ideal system.

Re: UK: Food inflation rises to 18.2% as it hits highest rate in over 45 years

#703

Post by cortesoft »

Nifty3929 wrote: post #454
samhuk wrote: post #167

As a person living in the UK, I have definitely noticed a considerable rise in unit prices. One of many examples is that a loaf of my favourite bread increased from £3 to £4 recently, which was a shocker. Toilet roll prices, as ever what the news loves to talk about, has exploded, increasing by around 70% since 2020 by my anecdotal observation. A sad thought I have about inflation is the fact that it is, wittingly or…

The lower class does suffer the most, but unfortunately it is the policies intended to help them which actually cause most of the problem. By giving money to people without producing more stuff - or even making it harder to produce the same - you MUST have inflation, rationing, or empty shelves - and often all three. The solution to allowing lower classes to have more stuff is to make it easier for everybody to produ…

> Imagine, for example, just giving everyone £10M to spend on whatever they want. This would not create any more stuff - but it would sure be a big equalizer for people buying that stuff!

This is mostly true, but it isn’t always, and it isn’t a perfect formula.

For example, there are some goods that have zero or negligible marginal costs to provide. For example, a streaming service. If people use the extra money they get to buy Netflix subscriptions, it isn’t like there will suddenly be a shortage of Netflix streams. It doesn’t take many resources to add additional subscribers for Netflix… it isn’t exactly zero margin, but it is pretty damn close.

This is even somewhat true for some physical goods. There is a lot of latent productivity in our economy… factories only running at 50% capacity, for example, or mines that aren’t producing all the ore they can because the demand doesn’t exist for what they produce. If demand suddenly increases because there is more money being spent, they can increase productivity without putting strain on the productive capacity of the industry.

Obviously this is not infinite capacity, but it is why it is not as simple as “creating more money == 1 to 1 equivalent inflation”. In other words, you aren’t going to get a 10% inflation if you add 10% to the money supply. It would be some fraction of that 10%.

Re: UK: Food inflation rises to 18.2% as it hits highest rate in over 45 years

#704

Post by Kon-Peki »

samstave wrote: post #609
purpleturtle22 wrote: post #380

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is because you probably make tech money (I do too). My family was poor growing up and we shopped by cent per oz, and noticed any significant price changes and went for alternatives. Planned dinner/produce/meat based off what was on sale, etc. Many, many people notice when milk goes up 50 cents. I still do.

I didnt grow up poor, and I have made "tech money" my entire career - but I very often check cent/oz on products - because I dont like being cheated at that level... HOWEVER. Annecdote: I was at dinner in SF - and we were at a very nice restaurant, nice wine, food etc. My buddy was kvetching over buying this watch, which was something like $200 and was talking about how he wasnt sure if it was worth it... I looked at…

> I very often check cent/oz on products - because I dont like being cheated at that level.

You have to do this in the cereal aisle! All the different-sized boxes of the same exact cereal have wildly different price-per-weight. And the largest-sized box is rarely the cheapest-per-weight!

what surprised me is how expensive plain Cheerios have become. My wife explained it as if I were stupid - they are mostly whole grains and very little garbage. All the other cereals have so much crap in them that the input price hasn't increased as much.

Re: UK: Food inflation rises to 18.2% as it hits highest rate in over 45 years

#705

Post by Nifty3929 »

dehrmann wrote: post #522
Nifty3929 wrote: post #465

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The fix is to produce more stuff. It's that simple. It might not be easy though. It would require us to focus on production, remove barriers, streamline regulations, encourage and actively celebrate production. It seems these days we're ambivalent toward the production of stuff, or even antagonistic to it in many cases. So we have less stuff. Combine this with giving people more money and you get inflation.

So much of what supermarkets sell is commoditized that this doesn't work. Toothpaste is in a very different place than EVs.

Commodities need to be produced as well. The more we produce, the more we will have. Giving people more money does not produce any additional bread or tomatoes.

Re: UK: Food inflation rises to 18.2% as it hits highest rate in over 45 years

#706

Post by Ekaros »

symlinkk wrote: post #428
astockwell wrote: post #385

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And that is OK, as long as you recognize your position of extreme privilege there.

I don’t think it’s “extreme privilege” to not notice a price increase of maybe $3? I could see it if you’re living in extreme poverty but anyone middle class and above shouldn’t waste mental energy on things like that

That is just single item, let's take buying something like 50 items a week and half of those go up by 3. So 75 more spend in week or 300 in a month. That is not exactly small amount for middle class.

Re: UK: Food inflation rises to 18.2% as it hits highest rate in over 45 years

#707

Post by fknorangesite »

jlengrand wrote: post #661
bruce343434 wrote: post #443

Earlier quoted context omitted.

By far the most abundant chemical in any modern human is dihydrogen monoxide, I'm not sure that any hydrocarbon you will find in a tortilla is really even a comparison.

Hey, incidentally that very chemical is a major part of the recipe! My bad, English isn't my native language. I guess I meant additives?

> My bad

Nah, it's just that the comment you're responding to is being insufferably pedantic. Your colloquial use of "chemicals" here is perfectly well understood.

Re: UK: Food inflation rises to 18.2% as it hits highest rate in over 45 years

#708

Post by __MatrixMan__ »

colossal wrote: post #312
__MatrixMan__ wrote: post #277

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"rich" and "poor" are just holdovers from conquerer and conquered. Just because the mandate that one group acknowledge the other's right to create value by fiat (e.g. by stamping Caesar's face into a coin) is no longer delivered by guys with swords doesn't make it not a conspiracy by one group to keep another group in its place.

well it still is delivered by guys with swords in a sense -- now they're just guys with guns and jumpsuits bearing the words "US ARMY."

They got smarter about it in the late 70's. The rich don't even have to send guys anymore, they just send guns to the local thugs with an agreement that those thugs will, upon seizing power, hook the local economy into the US banking system.

The thugs get to keep the loans, but the debt gets transferred to the local community, which cements the "somebody who isn't you gets to create abstractions that you have to treat as money"-part of the deal.

The words that used to go with it are "progressive free-market policies", but I think Kamala Harris recently called it "anti-corruption" or something along those lines.

Re: UK: Food inflation rises to 18.2% as it hits highest rate in over 45 years

#709

Post by hydrometallurgy »

somenameforme wrote: post #662
theturtletalks wrote: post #590

Earlier quoted context omitted.

His argument is that the government can do 2 things: 1. Interest-free money for businesses to launch, grow, and advance. This leads to more goods in the market and thus lower prices 2. Free money straight to the people which means more money in the market and thus, inflation, empty shelves, etc. His general point is that having interest-free money keeps existing players honest since newcomers can come in and start a…

The US has had extremely low interest rates for a very long time, and yet effective competition is further than ever in many industries. Something I'd observe is how unreasonably difficult it can be to legally sell things in the US. For instance hitting on this topic (of food prices), why can't I simply start baking bread and selling it? You can make an amazing loaf of bread for a tiny fraction of what people pay in…

This is a highly relevant point. The more difficult it is to learn about and comply with regulations, the fewer businesses will attempt to do so.

In some cases, business simply ignore regulations that that are obscure or inefficient to comply with; this leads to corruption and/or shadow economies.

In more cases, business is simply discouraged and doesn’t grow, or just doesn’t start at all.

The messy patchwork is city, (sometimes) county and state licensing and taxation framework in the US is a huge drag on small business.

I am not arguing for no regulation, licensing, or taxation, only that these entities recognize that requiring businesses to file paper tax returns every quarter, even if they have done zero business in a given city is a significant hindrance to business activity.

Re: UK: Food inflation rises to 18.2% as it hits highest rate in over 45 years

#710

Post by makingstuffs »

NalNezumi wrote: post #576
Nifty3929 wrote: post #454

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The lower class does suffer the most, but unfortunately it is the policies intended to help them which actually cause most of the problem. By giving money to people without producing more stuff - or even making it harder to produce the same - you MUST have inflation, rationing, or empty shelves - and often all three. The solution to allowing lower classes to have more stuff is to make it easier for everybody to produ…

This seems to come from the same place as the argument of "trickle down economics". Yea no, I've seen similar things done in Japan with abenomics (with one of the targeted goal even being more inflation; without achieving it) and studies show it doesn't work. Those spending never reaches the "lower classes", and seldom even reach places where it would have the potential to increase productivity. It's a tired, old arg…

Yeah, the reality is that this will always be the case as long as the national minimum wage (rebranded as the living wage) is in no way related to inflation or the GDP of the country.

As long as execs and CEOs are free to reap the benefits brought by their staff without paying any of it back this problem will continue to be exasperated.

Another contributing factor in the matter is the fact that politicians seem to be immune from the affects of their policies.

This gives them very little incentive to actually help people at the bottom of the totem pole as their funding is coming from the very same people whom are essentially exploiting a desperate workforce.

Is a shelf stacker in Sainsburys a high skilled job? No. Is it absolutely crucial in order for Sainsburys to have a working business? Yes.

The same is true for the cleaner in a bank. If a bank is covered in dirt and stinks people are not going to bank there. Likewise with cleaners of trains and pretty much any other industry.

When you pair the fact that governments are funded by the same people whom are also funding a divisive narrative throughout all media outlets you end up with a grim and bleak outlook for society.

As someone that has come from below 0 to get a good job and try and get out of the council estate poverty cycle it really strikes a nerve when people act as though we get given handouts for nothing.

My mother worked her damn arse off through my childhood and continues to do so now as a 69 year old woman with chronic health issues. She has been left behind and forgotten by society and ill informed people seem to lack any ability to see beyond the outliers in shows like benefits Britain.

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