Food Inflation post goes viral
Have food prices at Wal-Mart really tripled? Or have they gone up just 1 percent like the government says? Whatever the real figure, we should all know the government is lying.
A post on TikTok about Wal-Mart grocery store inflation has “gone viral.”
A poster said he recently re-ordered the exact same 45 items from Wal-Mart that he’d ordered in 2022 and found that his prices went up from $126.67 to $414.37 - which would equate to Wal-Mart grocery store prices more than tripling in two years (or inflation of 228 percent)!
Note: The original video was apparently posted on Reddit and was picked up on TikTok. To gauge the reaction to this post, I read many of the Reddit comments.
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“Not so fast, my friends!” replied many posters, pointing out that, while prices have obviously gone up, they couldn’t have gone up this much in just two years.
Many skeptics say this man’s order was massively inflated because Wal-Mart replaced items it no longer stocked with items from “third-party vendors” - which made the prices sky-rocket and showed, no pun intended, this was not an “apples-to-apples” comparison.
Other posters said they’d performed the same “re-order” exercise/experiment and found that prices had barely gone up at all. Still others said they’d done the same thing and found their bill had gone up significantly - often about 20 to 25 percent - but not 228 percent.
This viral debate interests me because I’ve longed believed our government - via its Department of Labor CPI reports - brazenly lies about “real inflation.”
To me, the important point is not that the government has figured out ways to rig the CPI reports (to me, that’s a given) … it’s that the government lies about virtually every important set of data it produces and distributes to the public.
For example, I think almost all government-provided statistics on Covid are embellished, inflated, manipulated and/or concealed to promote a “false narrative.”
This false narrative is/was incredibly important as it was used to create and perpetuate the “deadly virus” narrative that justified the lockdowns and then the Covid “vaccines.” (’Twas the Bogus Narratives that made society ultra compliant).
My two cents on the viral TikTok video …
Put me in the group of shoppers who say food inflation at Wal-Mart hasn’t increased 3.28-fold in two years. However, I didn’t fall off a turnip truck last week; I know food inflation is vastly higher than what the government tells us.
What does the government say food inflation is?
According to the most recent CPI report, the price of “food at home” increased only 1 percent between May 2023 and May 2024.
This would mean that if you bought 30 food items at your grocery store in May 2023 and those items cost $100, the same 30 items would cost you only $101 last month (May 2024).
To which I reply: Any person who believes this piece of brazen disinformation is suffering from cognitive decline at least 100 percent worse than Joe Biden’s.
Anecdotal evidence from Carrie and Bill …
While my wife does most of our grocery shopping, I often go to the store as well. From my own observations, food inflation seems like it’s at least 50 percent in the last year or two (which would be about 25 percent per year).
For example, a head of lettuce that not-that-long-ago cost approximately $2.00 at my neighborhood Piggly Wiggly is now $3.00 (not counting sales tax). That’s 50 percent “lettuce inflation” right there.
Campbell’s chicken noodle soup - Jack’s favorite meal - is now $1.69 when not long ago I could buy the same can for around $1.00 (69-percent inflation.)
Jack also like’s Campbell’s Chunky Chicken Noodle Soup. My wife tells me that two days ago that can cost $2.26 at Wall-Mart when, not that long ago, we used to be able to get the same can for about $1.50.
Eggs, one of the cheapest foods, are now much higher and paper products have gone through the roof.
Snacks, cookies and chips are at least 50 percent higher IMO. (I wish I had taken a photo of a bag of Ruffles potato chips at Publix which were $5.49 at a display case in the front of the store. Not long ago, I could buy that same bag for $2.49).
Until just recently, a 2-liter Coke at the convenience store I visit on a daily basis was $2.29. Today, it’s $2.69.
Some of the Reddit posts are from people who say they shop for a family of four and can get a month’s worth of groceries for $200 to $300. We also happen to be a family of four and my wife confirms that she spends approximately $200 …every week.
I can confirm I used to be able to fill a buggy to the brim and pay no more than $200. Whenever I fill the buggy all the way to the top today, I’m going to have to pay at least $300. This would mean “fully-buggy,” grocery-store inflation has gone up $100 (50 percent).
Carrie sent me another link from TikTok …
This lady simply saved receipts from items she’d purchased between 2019 to 2023 from Wegmans. The price increases she documents are eye-opening. For example, a box of Cinnamon Toast Crunch cereal that was $3.19 had increased to $4.59 (an increase of 44 percent).
Brownstone’s experts agree with me …
A recent excellent piece from The Brownstone Institute by Jeffrey Tucker and Peter St Onge expounded on real inflation.
Like myself, the authors state all government-produced economic statistics are either extremely dubious or preposterous lies. (This would also include the country’s “official” unemployment and GDP data).
The authors make the point that nobody knows what real inflation really is. Wrote the authors (emphasis added by me):
“What did the money injection do? It generated inflation. How much? Sadly, we do not know. The Bureau of Labor Statistics simply cannot keep up, partially because the Consumer Price Index does not calculate the following: interest on anything, taxes, housing, health insurance (accurately), homeowners insurance, car insurance, government services like public schools, shrinkflation, quality declines, substitutions due to price, or additional service fees.
“… ShadowStats estimates inflation in double digits two years running, having peaked at 17%. Just adding in interest, a paper from NBER estimates, takes 2023 inflation to 19%.
“… When you add it all up, you get a strange sense that nothing we are being told is real. According to official data, the dollar has lost about 23 cents in purchasing power over the last four years. Absolutely no one believes this. Depending on what you actually spend money on, the real answer is closer to 35 cents or 50 cents or even 75 cents…or more. We do not know what we cannot know.
“And yet even now, we seem to be more blind than ever before. The difference is that nowadays, we are supposed to trust and rely on data that no one even believes is real.
“We live with a don’t-ask-don’t-tell economy. No one wants to say high inflation. No one wants to say economic depression. Above all else, never admit the truth …”
*** End excerpt. ***
Regarding the Joe Biden Debate Debacle, I keep trying to highlight the real scandal - “Above all else, (our officials) never admit the truth.”
Just like with official food inflation, everyone knows the White House’s pronouncements (“Biden is as sharp as a tack”) were lies that should have insulted everyone’s intelligence.
Apparently, with some stories - I’d say, perhaps, with all stories - the government knows it HAS to lie.
What scares growing numbers of citizens is just how accomplished the government is at creating so many diabolical and ingenious mechanisms for concealing the truth.
Another source of grave worry is that everyone who matters accepts these pronouncements as the gospel truth.
Whatever the official narrative is … we know it’s a lie …
At the moment, the “official” inflation (and food inflation) narrative is that things are getting much better - that inflation is going down and food prices barely changed over the last 12 months.
At some point, that force known as the “public” (aka “the masses”) will surely proclaim, “Enough already. We know you guys lie about everything.”
Indeed, the public just saw undeniable evidence of this in the presidential debate.
(Public: “Dang. Biden really does suffer from serious dementia. Our leaders told us this wasn’t true.”)
For four years, some of us knew the same government agencies and “watchdog” press lied about every important Covid “metric.”
One assumes most citizens know the inflation reports are also giant whoppers - food inflation might not be 228 percent, but it’s damn sure not 1 percent.
I’ll close with the question that really interests me: When the majority of the public reaches the conclusion our “trusted” public servants cannot be trusted, what comes next?
I guess we’ll have to stay tuned to find out that answer.
(I’m in the small group of Substack authors who have NOT increased the price of an annual subscription to my newsletter.)
The recent Brownstone article on inflation and other dubious economic statistics also made reference to what's sometimes referred to as the "Big Mac Index," which I think IS a much-better indicator of real inflation than the CPI reports. Write the authors:
"Various studies have shown that since 2019 fast food prices — a gold standard in financial markets for measuring true inflation — have outpaced official CPI by between 25% and 50%."
Another hidden inflation category is fines and fees or licenses. The government gets us with speeding-ticket and red-light ticket fees - which keep going up far faster than the CPI rate. And, of course, many cities now have cameras at every intersection to issue those tickets.
Also, local and state governments must be making a killing on sales tax receipts. If a buggy of groceries that used to cost $200 now costs $300, the sales tax has gone up from $20 to $30. (Alabama sales tax is 10 percent in most cities). That's an increase of 50 percent sales tax receipts on every buggy of groceries ($20 to $30).