Shot in the Dark

Assurances

Joe Doakes from Como park emails:

Remember my picture from two months ago, complaining the price which had been 2 for $6, had jumped to 2 for $8? It’s up again. Two for $9. But don’t worry, the Lesko Brandon Administration has assured me there is no inflation.

I know what you’re thinking, the earlier picture was from Cub and this one is from HyVee. It’s not an apples-to-apples comparison. Correct. Because HyVee has it, but Cub does not. Cub has been out of stock for weeks. Which is not a supply chain issue; the Lesko Brandon Administration assures me there are no ships waiting to unload in port, the supply chain problems have been solved.
There can be only one explanation: this is obvious price gouging by greedy corporations in the lucrative retail grocery industry. Senator Warren, are you listening?
Joe Doakes

Somewhere in the Jersey suburbs of Philadelphia, Gus Tostito is rolling in ill-gotten gains, lighting his cigars with $100 bills.

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10 responses to “Assurances”

  1. bosshoss429 Avatar
    bosshoss429

    That’s not the only thing that hasn’t been in stock. Have you tried to buy Fritos lately? No grocery stores have had them since early December. I ended up getting the last two bags on the shelf at a Holiday gas station in Bloomington, but haven’t been able to get any since then. I have been checking at least three grocery stores and a couple of gas stations around the south metro and western Wisconsin for the past two weeks, too.

    I’m making chili for the Super Bowl and like to serve Fritos with it. Guess I’ll have to stick with just tortilla chips.

  2. Loren Avatar
    Loren

    Frito-Lay HQ is in Plano, TX. We don’t have Fritos either.

    My wife likes Special K cereal. Haven’t been able to find any for 8 weeks. Emailed Kelloggs, who told me it wasn’t discontinued, but could not tell me where to find any.

  3. bosshoss429 Avatar
    bosshoss429

    Loren:
    Yea, there is a Frito-Lay distribution center in Bloomington. I even stopped by there to see what’s going on. They claimed that plant workers where they are made, is on strike, but can’t confirm. This still doesn’t make sense, because there are usually enough management types to get at least half of the normal production.

    On another note, a couple of my heavy construction customers are telling me that they can’t get Rotella 5-40 synthetic oil, either. 10-40 is too thick in cold weather. Everyone uses that oil in their Diesel engines. They have been given no ETA on when their suppliers will get it and report at least a two month back order. Supposedly, neither Shell, who owns the Rotella line nor any other companies are manufacturing it right now.

  4. justplainangry Avatar
    justplainangry

    If you do not like the numbers, just change the formula! Fuck ’em ALL!

    You couldn’t miss the headlines: The annual percentage increase in inflation clocked in at 7.5%, making it the worst increase in 40 years. (snip) real inflation is probably even worse than the accelerated rate suggests. That’s because, in 1990, the government changed how it calculated inflation (something it also did in 1980). John Williams’s Shadow Government Statistics calculates inflation as it would have been calculated before 1980 and before 1990. According to his numbers, inflation would have been over 15% using pre-1980 metrics and over 10% using pre-1990 metrics. You don’t need the numbers, though, to tell you what you already know.

  5. Joe Doakes Avatar
    Joe Doakes

    Here’s an analysis that I have not seen in the media (so E and P don’t know about it to cut-and-paste):

    A price increase of $1 on $6 item is 16%
    A price increase of $1 on $8 item is 12.5%
    A price increase of $1 on $9 item is 11%
    The rate of inflation is coming down.
    Success!

    Brandon’s Build Back Better Boondoggle hasn’t even passed yet, and it’s working! Hooray, Brandon is a hero. We must re-elect him at once.

    True, the price of the item is still 50% higher than before and there are none on the shelves, but that’s because of Trump, and Covid. And Canadian truckers, the Insurrection. Mayor Pete ran out of gas. He had a flat tire. He didn’t have enough money for cab fare. His tux didn’t come back from the cleaners. An old friend came in from out of town. Someone stole his car. There was an earthquake. A terrible flood. Locusts! IT ISN’T OUR FAULT!

  6. Night Writer Avatar
    Night Writer

    Well, gas prices shoot up before a holiday weekend, so dip prices could logically increase before Super Bowl weekend. Or not.

    I’ve been baffled by the unavailability of distilled water for my CPAP. After scouring several stores in my community I finally found 4 jugs in the next town over (I only took 2). My weight-conscious wife keeps her sweet tooth at bay with Quaker Oats chocolate rice cakes: these currently can’t be found in our area, or even on Amazon. WTF? I don’t recall ever seeing a distilled water tanker ship on the high seas, and I don’t think there’s a trucker strike between here and the Quaker plant in Cedar Rapids.

    I’ll know things are really getting serious when our Blue Apron meal kits get delivered by armed guards, unless the local warlord intercepts them first.

  7. bikebubba Avatar
    bikebubba

    Thanks, Democrats, for insisting that we pay people not to work during COVID, and for insisting that everybody accept a vaccine whether or not they want it as a condition of employment. It’s not like lower paid workers–say like the guys who work in the Frito-Lay factory or in warehouses–respond to economic incentives or anything like that.

    I saw a poster on the back of a semi advertising $2500/week pay for drivers last night. That’s how bad things are getting–apparently the pay per mile is about doubled.

  8. Joe Doakes Avatar
    Joe Doakes

    Sam’s Club in Woodbury has a sandwich sign as you enter: “$18 an hour to start.”

    Blew past $15 in what, a year? I suppose now I have to fight for $20?

  9. Night Writer Avatar
    Night Writer

    Blew past $15 in what, a year? I suppose now I have to fight for $20?
    Because no one can live on $15/hour.

  10. Inflated | Shot in the Dark

    […] when the Lesko Brandon administration was insisting price inflation didn’t exist, I detailed the recent history of price increases in a single product as a way to prove the […]

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