Misery

We're whining lately about the amount of money we spend on groceries. About once a month, we have beef liver ... we both like it, and I cook it by a Marcella Hazan recipe that consists in simply flouring it and cooking it very quickly in a mixture of oil and butter, then squeezing a lemon into the pan. Lemon subdues the livery whang. I'ts delicious and cheap. But thereby hangs a tale. Maybe a year ago, the little one-lb carton of liver would cost one tiny American dollar. Such a deal for a bunch of protein for two people. Then a little while back, the price started showing up at $1.50. That's a 50% rise. The last carton was priced at $2. The gummint keeps on saying that inflation is minimal, but they don't count food, the thing we use every day and buy most frequently. We're supposed to get a little raise in SocSec in Jan, but it'll be all gobbled up by raise in Medicare premium. According to the HuffPo, we, collectively, aren't too happy with all this.

The misery index -- which is simply the sum of the country's inflation and unemployment rates -- rose to 13.0, pushed up by higher price data the government reported on Wednesday.

Read all that here.
And from CNBC, more of the same:

Think life is not as good as it used to be, at least in terms of your wallet? You'd be right about that. The standard of living for Americans has fallen longer and more steeply over the past three years than at any time since the US government began recording it five decades ago.

Read all that here.