The cost of living our lives is rising [Archive]

Truth Detector

02-07-2008, 04:12 PM

We all complain about the cost of living rising, but, how much of it is really a change in how we live our lives? I thought this was an interesting piece on that.

http://www.politibyte.com/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=53

Yeah, prices have gone up on most things, but look at the amount of "things" we now need.

Great commentary; something that is also glossed over in the debate about how "bad" things are is how little our technology costs these days.

Back in the 1980's a cell phone was the size of a brief case, cost me about $1,000 and the typical cell phone bill, for barely reliable service, would be about $1,000 a month for a busy person.

I also bought an IBM PC with a color monitor and 640K. I was rocking and was more than willing to shell out $3,000 for it and then upgrade it with a 20K hard drive. I was way ahead of the game with this technology.

One thing is certain, the ones who are always crying that the "sky-is-falling" are only the political chicken little's who attempt to promote a failed political agenda, forget the past and live in blissful historical ignorance in the present.

"We say today's food prices make it so hard to feed our family on a budget. In the early '70s, Birds Eye Cool Whip went for 38 cents a tub and a can of Campbell's tomato soup was a dime. Coffee was under $2 a pound and fresh grapes just 69 cents a pound, a real difference from the $2 and up prices we've seen for grapes in the grocery stores lately. "

Using my trusty inflation calculator http://data.bls.gov/cgi-bin/cpicalc.pl, I computed the cost of these items today using 1972 as the base year:

Birds Eye Cool Whip: $1.88 a tub
Can of Campbell's soup: $.50
Pound of Coffee: $9.92
Fresh Grapes: $3.42

My IBM PC with 640K in 1982: $6,445.87
My first Cell Phone in 1986: $1,891.81

Yep, if we look at inflation, things could be a LOT worse (and if we put Democrats back in charge).
:thumbsup: