You can run, but you can’t hide: Inflation is busting budgets, and killing joy too.
What was striking about the data was that a lot of the worst inflation is hitting us at home: rent was up 7.2%, electricity prices are up 15.5%, groceries are up 13%.
Seeing as how it’s spooky season, and the economy seems to be full of monsters, I thought it appropriate to invoke the classic horror film When a Stranger Calls (1979) –a terrifying tale of a woman babysitting a couple of kids, who keeps getting calls from a creepy stranger. She finally has the call traced (this was waaaay back in the days of landlines) and the operator calls back with the terrifying news: The calls are coming from inside the house!
Inflation, too, is coming from inside the house: lurking inside a carton of eggs (30.5% more expensive than last year), crouching in your closet (prices for women’s suits are up 10%, men’s suits are up 9.5%), or even hiding inside the walls (utility gas up 33.1%).
But unlike the killer in When a Stranger Calls, inflation doesn’t tend to get us with one deadly strike. Instead, it’s been hanging around for months, destroying our peace of mind and stealing some joy out of life. Because there’s no avoiding paying for shelter, food and health insurance (up 28.2%,the biggest jump on record) consumers have to find other places to cut back: everything from vacations to eating out to even giving up favorite activities or foods.