Prices Soar For Gasoline, Food, Clothes, Housing
By Josh Resnek
The inflation blues are hitting home for all of us.
In 2020, the inflation rate was 1.2%.
This month, the inflation rate is at 8.56%. The highest inflation rate during modern time was in 1917 when it reached 19.66%. Inflation erodes our purchasing power. It erodes the value of our paper money.
Energy prices have soared.
They have increased 30.3%.
Gasoline prices have almost doubled.
Filling up our automobiles at more than $4.20 a gallon translate into more than $80 for a 20 gallon fill.
This compares to last year at this time when the same fill could have been done for half the price.
There seems to be no end in the rise right now – a terrifying reality.
Try to buy a new car. Prices are about 12% higher than sticker when you go to pay.
Because the Fed has raised interest rates, loans cost more than several months back.
Home values continue their inflationary rocket ship like behavior.
However, homes being worth so much and going higher in price from week to week makes it impossible for those who sell to buy another home.
We are all trapped in the inflationary cycle.
Food prices have soared. We all notice this when we go to the market.
Milk, bread, meat – nearly everything we buy to eat has risen in price.
Checking out is where this is noticed.
The average $50 purchase last month is now north of $62 – $63 dollars.
At the same time, our money is worth less because of the depreciation in the value of our paper money.
And now the stock market has done a bit of $7 trillion crash.
The New York Stock Exchange and the Nasdaq have tanked.
What does this translate into at a time when the cost for everything we purchase is soaring upward? The value of our portfolios, whatever we have, are heading in the other direction.
Portfolios for 401K’s and IRA accounts and for mutual funds and stocks have been driven down dramatically.
We are all worth less right now than we were a month ago – and the end of the downward spiral is nowhere in sight.
Nor is the upward cost for everything we use or buy.
This is not the end of the world.
What goes up must come down.
Eventually inflation will be tamed.
But this won’t be happening anytime soon.