Food Prices

[Jiggy]

I remember back in October we were supposed to see food prices come down. If anything, I've noticed them go up a bit.

What has your experience been?

*Please don't turn this into a political thread. All the parties suck in their own way, let's leave it at that*

[calgarygeologist]

The big chains were asked to submit their plans on price stabilization to the government by Nov 2.

[powderjunkie]

I think a key thing to remember with a lot of this inflation stuff is that prices are unlikely to come 'down' on most things (especially staples), but rather stay flat.

More luxury items (including say cuts of beef) will either tweak supply or tweak price...but I'd suspect the former more often.

[Cecil Terwilliger]

The big chains price stabilization plan is to continue to make political donations to both parties. This was nothing but grandstanding. Prices aren’t coming down.

Even talk of stabilization is hilarious. Sure, let’s stabilize the prices after all the big chains doubled the price of everything. Now we can stabilize for a few years lol. I bet they like the sound of that.

[undercoverbrother]

what if we started a food buyers union

[blankall]

I've noticed a lot of variation in prices. The "regular" prices of many items is way up, but a lot of retailers have items on "sale" for prices well below what they were several months ago. For example, price for a loaf of bread might be $4, but one of the lower end brands will be on sale for $2.50 at any given time.

[Table 5]

When people hear about inflation coming down, they erroneously think that it means that prices of items will start going back down... when in reality it just means that the pace that they are going up will slow. But it's all still compounded. That banana is not going to go back to $10 (or whatever a banana costs).

[powderjunkie]

There's always money in the banana stand.

[Monahammer]

Prices on anything coming down is largely malarky. That's just not how our economic system is set up to work, and "deflation" on a large scale would result in massive layoffs and worse economic pain.

The only solution is to try and make more money. Whether that's by negotiating for more in your current position (some workplaces have a defined COLA, for example) or by looking for a different job.

[fotze2]

Insert the post that is always inevitable in a thread like this, "I just make sure to buy in bulk and then make my own good food, nothing processed and it turns out to be cheaper, healthier, and in fact funner to make, its really quite a revelation".

[GordonBlue]

Originally Posted by fotze2

Insert the post that is always inevitable in a thread like this, "I just make sure to buy in bulk and then make my own good food, nothing processed and it turns out to be cheaper, healthier, and in fact funner to make, its really quite a revelation".

I was waiting for the "the solution is to just make more money" comment and it didn't take long.

[undercoverbrother]

Originally Posted by GordonBlue

I was waiting for the "the solution is to just make more money" comment and it didn't take long.

Boots have straps for a reason.

[bizaro86]

Originally Posted by GordonBlue

I was waiting for the "the solution is to just make more money" comment and it didn't take long.

I mean, practically speaking waiting for the government/grocers to lower prices is probably a bad plan.

So you can either make more or spend less. Make more is somewhat straightforward although not easy. Spend less can include trading down ingredients (ie lower $ cuts of meat, store brands), switching to a cheaper place (ie superstore/Walmart vs coop/safeway), switching to less prepared foods (which are generally cheaper).

Otherwise it's just "nope, grocery prices aren't going to actually come down no matter what JT said in a press conference" and the thread is over.

[Cecil Terwilliger]

I started stealing groceries and dealing drugs on the side. Both are quite lucrative.

[fotze2]

Does that Walmart $7 a month service have prices that are higher than the actual store?

The Costco delivery they had was brutal, prices were way higher than the store, so no real point to using it, but Walmart is easily $7 cheaper than Safeways and COOPs prices after an item or two, so that plus tip would totally be worth it.

[Firebot]

Originally Posted by Jiggy

I remember back in October we were supposed to see food prices come down. If anything, I've noticed them go up a bit.

What has your experience been?

*Please don't turn this into a political thread. All the parties suck in their own way, let's leave it at that*

While I understand not wanting to turn this into a political thread, the entire premise of your statement is political to begin with and not based off economics.

What made you believe that prices would come down? What market dynamics are in play that would cause food prices to go down (not inflation down, but actually down?

On the experience topic: experiences also tend to play games and are anecdotal, as you are likely to notice price shocks a lot easier than price reductions or subtle changes such as sizes go down and shrinkflation. For instance Coca-cola recently went from 591ml to 500ml while keeping the same price. While Pepsi still remains at 591ml and relatively similar priced (in essence cheaper), it won't be long before Pepsi follows suit.

Grapes are noticeably cheaper right now, but they are in season. KFC ran their 5$ daily deal for a while, but once it ended prices went significantly as well (a Big Crunch combo is now 13$).

A better measure is looking at your overall grocery bills, which goes up over time without changing buying habits.

[Jiggy]

Originally Posted by Firebot

While I understand not wanting to turn this into a political thread, the entire premise of your statement is political to begin with and not based off economics.

What made you believe that prices would come down? What market dynamics are in play that would cause food prices to go down (not inflation down, but actually down?

Back in September grocery CEO's were summoned to Ottawa to come up with a plan to somehow lower food prices.

[Johnny Makarov]

Originally Posted by Cecil Terwilliger

I started stealing groceries and dealing drugs on the side. Both are quite lucrative.

I remember reading some headlines about thieves stealing packages of meat from grocery stores about 5 years ago and thought what a ridiculous thing to steal... I guess I was the fool.

[Monahammer]

Originally Posted by GordonBlue

I was waiting for the "the solution is to just make more money" comment and it didn't take long.

You are welcome to present your solution, but aside from spending less, making more is the only way out of this erosion on quality of life.

The target rate for inflation in the country is 2% yoy. That means that at minimum your groceries (and everything else) is costing 2% more on average every year. You can shop sales, you can buy in bulk, you can do more cooking, whatever. Those all amount to lessening your costs and perhaps reducing your quality of life. The only way to maintain is to earn more.

The economy is a ponzi scheme. You need to fuel it with constant growth or the whole thing will collapse.

[Firebot]

Originally Posted by Jiggy

Back in September grocery CEO's were summoned to Ottawa to come up with a plan to somehow lower food prices.

Isn't that as political as it gets?

There has been no new bills or laws. The is no legislation forbidding prices to go up.

A few MPs and leaders talking tough so we can have news article 'slamming grocery CEOs' doesn't make food prices go down in itself.

I'm being realistic here as the premise of the post is flawed. Nothing was implemented.

We most certainly can talk of our experiences with food but nothing was 'supposed to go down'. There has been no economic deflationary pressure on food prices in general.