Loading ...I was referring to sectors or industries where the Gov’t has ways of holding down prices, like they’ve done with so many commodities. Or rigging the system to enable cheaper imports etc. I often posted charts of Copper going back to the 1970s $1/lb with no increase in prices until after 9/11. Then it zigged zagged up to $4/lb for example. Where you can see the gov’t losing the ability to get away with that.
As for older people when we were kids in the 1970s, we were doing very good with inflation, it was easy to get raises, every three months for me where I worked. We were making everything here and the boss had to just make less profit. We other young couples with good incomes moved into apartments, and priced out the older folks. Probably on fixed incomes. So sure older people may have been eating cat food?
Re your: “Airlines were definitely cheaper. I remember as a student I could fly for 50 dollars round trip. ”
We bought two tickets NY to LAX $500 in 1979. It was like 3 moths rent. My 1 bedroom apartment rent was $135/mo with utilities. A 1 bd apartment today is like $2000 X 3 the tickets were like todays $6000. The apartment was below market, and tickets prices were normal and affordable for the times.
These days the tickets have been held back. Hell the 9/11 day those planes only had 40 on board, loads of empty seats. How can airlines afford that without gov’t help. 40,000 planes in the sky at one time?? Even today, too cheap, zillions of people are or can afford to be frequent flyers, so much so not enough pilots lately. Why can’t prices be what they are supposed to be? Supply and demand setting the prices. Thats capitalism.
Not today. The artificial PRICE sets the demand an supply. Look, they screwed everything up, it all crashed in 2008, and ever since the system is trying right itself, as the central planners keep trying to fight the symptoms of change and reversal. The Game is ending, and they are resisting that end or reversal. The fake unit of account keeps changing. The chart below shows the boom and bust prices net flat until 2004, clearly see they can’t get away with it anymore. Most other charts look the same.