It’s that time of the month when the BLS lies through its statistical teeth and Wall Street parties on the lies. The bigger the lies, the better the response.
Yes, the “core” inflation was down! We’ll get to that in a minute. It’s pure BS.
But first, it wasn’t just stocks that partied but also bonds. Check out this orgy of ‘up and to the right’ that was kicked off by the supposedly tame CPI print.
Again, it was the entire complex of Western and Western-adjacent stocks that got the party vibe from the lame/tame US inflation print. It didn’t matter if you were a small cap, a large cap, an industrial, a tech stock, German, Japanese, or European – if you were a stock or stock index you vaulted higher on the news.
As you know by now, I am deeply skeptical of the entire edifice of “finance” knowing as I do just how much of it is disconnected from reality, dependent on Fed printing, and mainly used as a form of narrative control by the powers that be to keep the little folks sedated and complacent.
And that explains why it’s so important to understand the deception at a level sufficient to fully know what a load of bollox it is.
Maybe if people’s alcohol budget were lower, healthcare wouldn’t be getting so expensive! But really, it’s like they’re not even trying to hide the fact that these books are cooked, they’re so obviously bogus.
My personal experience is healthcare premiums through state employer went down for 2024 and didn’t go up much the previous year. I know that’s not the norm from what I’m hearing from my patients though.
However, our four auto and homeowner’s insurance rates are up 24-70% from last year, with the biggest increase in condo coverage. Property taxes had a massive hike despite property values being stagnant for the last year. Some perishable grocery items are often almost double last year’s prices, but other items that I buy in bulk, such as cat food, are unchanged since last year. Overall, I’ve never seen increases like this before (I was a little kid in the 70s-early 80s), but from what I’m finding, it looks like it would be easy to cherry pick select items that haven’t moved much in price to create an appearance of lower inflation.
It occurred to me that I don’t spend a penny on health insurance and I spend very little - like $75 less than once a year kind of little- on doctor visits, and I take no pharma drugs. I’m wondering if they got their weighted number of .52 after factoring in all the people in this country that don’t have health insurance and therefore spend zero dollars, including maybe Medicare recipients?
Funny and true story at my doctor’s office in the recent past. I go into the doc’s office to check out a new pain in my foot, and to get a blood test since it had been about 4-5 years since my last blood test. The doc’s visit cost me $75 and the blood test cost me about $275, that I pay directly to the lab. The doc starts preaching to me that the blood test would be so much cheaper if I only had insurance. I told him, my health insurance was costing me almost $4000 per year and this blood test only costs me $275 every 4-5 years, that doesn’t sound cheaper to me. He couldn’t argue with that math.
I spend a helluva lot more on produce! My weighting would probably surpass the alcohol weighting. Food has gotten very expensive, especially organic food. I don’t purchase meat, poultry, or seafood, and still my grocery bill is through the roof. I have even almost completely stopped buying any prepared/frozen/health food type of foods because of the skyrocketing costs.
On the homestead, we are getting this incredible gentle constant drizzly rain for the last 2 days and more is forecast. It’s excellent weather for our newly planted carrots, beets, potatoes and winter rye grass. Can’t wait to see the beautiful green shoots of our winter grass; it’s a most vibrant green color and it’s soooo soft. I lay in it on warm, sunny winter days to soak up some sunshine.
I’m wondering if they got their weighted number of .52 after factoring in all the people in this country that don’t have health insurance and therefore spend zero dollars, including maybe Medicare recipients?
Well, one way or the other, we all pay for health care. Even if you don't use it much. It's really hard to evade something that is fully 1/6th of the entire bloated US economy. https://peakprosperity.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/11/Health-Care-percent-GDP-1700010087.2204.jpg
Thank you for sharing this foodle. I’ve done a lot of research in this area! Your post was one of the few that actually made an impression on me. Please continue to share your wisdom with the world by publishing thoughtful articles like this one.
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Our newly planted winter rye grass, potatoes, beets, and carrots are doing really well in this temperatures. I am eager to witness the stunning green shoots of our winter grass; the color is incredibly vivid and incredibly velvety. Even though home values have been flat for the past year, property taxes have increased geometry dash lite significantly. While the cost of some perishable supermarket products has frequently increased to nearly twice that of previous year, other bulk purchases I make, like cat food, have remained the same.
Very sorry to hear about your wife’s ailments and I wish the best outcome for her. When it comes to trauma, modern medicine is pretty brilliant, but it sounds like even advanced medicine cannot improve her prognosis. Prayers and well wishes for your family.
I can completely identify with Dave’s own health ailments. I am into my 64th year, my husband is in his 74th year and we’re becoming very conscious of our aging bodies. Interesting story about bladder sand. Last year I suffered from what I thought were kidney stones, but after reading about Dave’s condition, the description “sand” is exactly how I described what was excreted in my urine. My condition resolved itself with no side effects.
You see, I have an invisible force field of protection around me called “no health insurance” so I don’t get wrangled into every medical intervention available to man, or uh, woman in my case.
This year’s YIR was a real treat. Every year, I am impatiently waiting for Dave Collum’s Year in Review to post, however this year was different. I’ve been so busy, I completely forgot about my favorite read. When I opened up PP and saw the latest YIR, it was such a great surprise, I’m thinking this will be the best Christmas present ever!
Thank you Dave, for all your insights and especially your humor, laughed out loud several times, looking forward to more PP discussions on what’s been posted, and anxiously awaiting Part 3 next year.
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