{"id":69150,"date":"2013-09-13T19:42:59","date_gmt":"2013-09-13T18:42:59","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/breaking-news\/a-measure-of-our-impoverishment-which-they-hope-you-havent-noticed\/69150\/"},"modified":"2013-09-13T19:52:13","modified_gmt":"2013-09-13T18:52:13","slug":"a-measure-of-our-impoverishment-which-they-hope-you-havent-noticed","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/latest-news\/a-measure-of-our-impoverishment-which-they-hope-you-havent-noticed\/","title":{"rendered":"A Measure of Our Impoverishment (Which They Hope You Haven\u2019t Noticed)"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"ftpimagefix\" style=\"float: none;\"><strong><em>This article is by Eric Peters. Visit his <a href=\"http:\/\/ericpetersautos.com\/category\/politics\/\" target=\"_blank\">political blog and commentary<\/a> for more views, analysis and updates.<\/em><\/strong><\/div>\n<p>It&#8217;s getting close to October \u2014 to Halloween \u2014 and Cadbury has released a new, Halloween-themed Creme Egg. It&#8217;s like the ones they sell around Easter \u2014 only the gooey insides are green instead of yellow. Forgive me. I <em>like<\/em>these chocolate eggs \u2014 no matter the color of the insides \u2014 and can&#8217;t resist grabbing a handful when I see the display box at the supermarket. But I noticed that more fit in my hand now than used to. The Cadbury Creme Egg went from being about the same size as a normal chicken egg \u2014 to the size of a <em>robin&#8217;s<\/em> egg. It&#8217;s about a third smaller now \u2014 but the <em>price<\/em> remains the same.<\/p>\n<p>Watch this video; see for yourself:<\/p>\n<div class=\"youtube-embed\" data-video_id=\"_FiA57ir5QM\"><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Cadbury Conspiracy\" width=\"696\" height=\"522\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/_FiA57ir5QM?feature=oembed&#038;enablejsapi=1\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/div>\n<p>Similarly chocolate bars \u2014 which have been downsized, too. They are about a third smaller in terms of overall dimensions \u2014 and also, <em>thinner<\/em>. Have you noticed? (Here&#8217;s a <a href=\"http:\/\/www.thisismoney.co.uk\/money\/news\/article-2232345\/Its-official-shrinking-chocolate-bars-ARE-factor-rising-inflation.html\" target=\"_blank\">recent news story<\/a> about that.)<\/p>\n<p>Of course, the <em>price<\/em> of chocolate bars hasn&#8217;t gone down, either. You pay more for the same \u2014 which means, you pay <em>more<\/em> for <em>less<\/em> \u2014 and they hope you&#8217;re too dumb to notice. Or, perhaps, they are counting on the psychological angle; that it is preferable to see \u201cprice stability\u201d \u2014 even to the extent of willfully ignoring that you&#8217;re getting less and less of whatever the item is and paying the same (or, in some cases, <em>more<\/em>).<\/p>\n<p>I take OsteoBiFlex \u2014 a supplement that&#8217;s supposed to help keep your joints limber. Just bought a bottle \u2014 the same size <em>bottle<\/em>. But <em>inside<\/em> the opaque, deep blue bottle \u2014 half empty! Not even cotton to fill the air gap.<\/p>\n<p>I admit it&#8217;s clever. Much less clumsy, at any rate, than simply jacking up the price. Corporate America is nothing if not clever. Lawyers are often disparaged as shysters, but Corporate America is the true master of the art of shysterism. They get us to refer to their <em>ads<\/em> as \u201csponsored content.\u201d They advise that we&#8217;ll \u201c<em>learn<\/em> more\u201d (really? Gosh! It&#8217;s like a free college course\u2026) if we click on said \u201csponsored content.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>They can \u2014 and do \u2014 sell us anything.<\/p>\n<p>The latest being <em>inflation<\/em>.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignleft\" alt=\"morans\" src=\"http:\/\/shtfplan.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/09\/morans1.jpg\" width=\"270\" height=\"263\" \/>People ought to be seriously uneasy about the unmistakable intrusion of its reality into their American Idolized, <a href=\"http:\/\/ericpetersautos.com\/2012\/11\/09\/fuuuuhhhhhhhtttball-the-modern-two-minutes-hate\/\" target=\"_blank\"><em>Fuuuuuuhhhhtttball<\/em><\/a> venerating lives. The federal government can fudge \u2014 can outright lie \u2014 about the various indicators of economic health. Can shift <em>perceptions<\/em>of reality. But reality can&#8217;t be dismissed so easily. If it takes more dollars to purchase cocoa or sugar then the price of a Creme Egg or chocolate bar <em>has<\/em> to increase commensurately in order to maintain the same equilibrium between the cost to make the item and the profit it earns. When the economy is flooded with funny money \u2014 \u201cquantitative easing,\u201d another euphemism whose sole purpose is to obfuscate reality \u2014 the value of a given thing remains the same but its <em>apparent cost<\/em>increases. It takes more sheaves of funny money to buy the same item. This is inflation.<\/p>\n<p>And, because the average person cannot magically increase the amount of paper currency he carries (only the \u201cFederal\u201d Reserve can <em>legally<\/em> counterfeit) he is systematically impoverished.<\/p>\n<p>The powers that be are trying to keep a lid on a pressure cooker that&#8217;s on the verge of blowing its top. Since 2008, the economy of the United State (<em>singular<\/em>, in the interests of honest language) has been injected with \u201cliquidity\u201d \u2014 that is, with historically unparalleled sheaves of manufactured money, in a desperate financial Hail Mary attempt to forestall the inevitable, a correction of just as unparalleled historic awfulness.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignright\" alt=\"Fed-Funny-Money-picture-300x252\" src=\"http:\/\/shtfplan.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/09\/Fed-Funny-Money-picture-300x252.jpg\" width=\"300\" height=\"252\" \/>They claim inflation is \u201cunder control\u201d \u2014 only about 2-3 percent annually (see <a href=\"http:\/\/www.business-standard.com\/article\/opinion\/martin-feldstein-the-rise-and-rise-of-us-interest-rates-113090900893_1.html\" target=\"_blank\">here<\/a>). If so, then why does our Fed Funny Money (which we&#8217;re <em>forced<\/em> to use; a point that must be made in deference, once again, to honest language) buy ever diminishing quantities of almost everything? The fact that the <em>price<\/em> of these items hasn&#8217;t gone up by double digits doesn&#8217;t change the underlying fact that the size\/quantity of what you get has gone down by double digits, or almost.<\/p>\n<p>More money \u2014 for less stuff.<\/p>\n<p>If it were just Creme Eggs \u2014 or chocolate bars \u2014 one might shrug it off as a localized aberration. Something to do with volatility in a given market. Or, perhaps some sort of price-fixing flim-flam within a given industry. But it&#8217;s happening across the board \u2014 as anyone who shops for basic staples, food and so on, already knows. The bag of groceries that cost $50 five years ago now costs $70 \u2014 and there&#8217;s less in the bag, too. Gas costs <em>twice<\/em> what it did just five years ago. We&#8217;ve just gotten used to $3.40 as the New Normal.<\/p>\n<p>It&#8217;s a canary in the coal mine, folks.<\/p>\n<p>How much smaller can a Creme Egg get?<\/p>\n<hr \/>\n<p><em>Eric Peters is an automotive columnist and author who has written for the <\/em><em>Detroit News<\/em> and <em>Free Press<\/em>, <em>Investors Business Daily<\/em>, <em>The American Spectator<\/em>, <em>National Review<\/em>, The <em>Chicago Tribune<\/em> and <em>Wall Street Journal. <\/em>His books include <em><a href=\"http:\/\/www.amazon.com\/Road-Hogs-Detroits-Beautiful-Performance\/dp\/0760337640\/\" target=\"_blank\">Road Hogs<\/a><\/em> (2011) and <em><a href=\"http:\/\/www.amazon.com\/Automotive-Atrocities-Cars-Love-Hate\/dp\/0760317879\/\" target=\"_blank\">Automotive Atrocities<\/a><\/em> (2004). His next book, <em>\u201cThe Politics of Driving,\u201d<\/em> is scheduled for release soon. Visit his web site at <a href=\"http:\/\/ericpetersautos.com\/\" target=\"_blank\">Eric Peters Autos<\/a>. You can <a href=\"http:\/\/ericpetersautos.com\/donate\/\" target=\"_blank\">visit Eric&#8217;s donate page here<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Copyright: <a title=\"A Measure of Our Impoverishment (Which They Hope You Haven\u2019t Noticed)\" href=\"http:\/\/feedproxy.google.com\/~r\/SHTFplan\/~3\/PiZ3G8oH5vk\/a-measure-of-our-impoverishment-which-they-hope-you-havent-noticed_09132013\" target=\"_blank\">SHTF Plan<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>This article is by Eric Peters. Visit his political blog and commentary for more views, analysis and updates. It&#8217;s getting close to October \u2014 to Halloween \u2014 and Cadbury has released a new, Halloween-themed Creme Egg. It&#8217;s like the ones they sell around Easter \u2014 only the gooey insides are green instead of yellow. Forgive [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":69151,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[487,18],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-69150","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-breaking-news","8":"category-latest-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/69150","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=69150"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/69150\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/69151"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=69150"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=69150"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=69150"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}