The latest inflation figures provided by Consumer Affairs/Datasembly show a 5.3% increase in grocery prices for 2023. Last year the price increase was 25.5%. So the inflation increase rate has slowed. The article by Justin Klawans entitled: “2023: the year of sticker shock” suggests that this is a good thing and that regular people should see it as the improvement that it is. But alas, apparently we’re too unsophisticated and ignorant to appreciate economics. We’re too hung up on the prices we’re paying — which are incidentally eroding our discretionary income — to grasp the beauty of the rate of inflation increase slowing down — not stopping mind you just slowing down. And we actually have the nerve to compare the prices to the pre-COVID numbers as well. How stupid is that! Everyone knows that that world no longer exists! What I didn’t realize is one of the symptoms of COVID was inflation. Silly me.
One of the things I found interesting in the article is the implication that our expectations are too high. What we’ve been wanting is deflation — where the prices actually go back down. Silly us. Of course, we should instead be satisfied that the prices, though still rising, are rising slower than before. Call me crazy, but I never thought the prices would continue to rise at the absurd rate they had been rising.
But the fact of the matter is we are paying a cumulative rate of inflation. Yes, they would prefer we just compare the prices to last year instead of pre-COVID. But really, what sense does that make? It’s like a sinking ship that’s already taken on a lot of water. They would have you focus on the rate of the ongoing leak rather than measure the standing water in the hold. And once again, the leak is still ongoing; the ship is merely not taking on water as quickly as it had before. What is troubling though is the captain and the crew appear to believe this is good enough. While the boat is continuing to take on water, they not only have not stopped the leak, they have no plans to bail out the boat from prior inflationary damage.
There is impracticality in their take on the economic forecast. They want people to focus on the abstract rather than the concrete. But in real life you deal with prices. When you get a bill more than likely you are obligated to pay the full amount. You can’t tell a utility company, I’ll pay 3/4 of the bill but increase my payment rate by 5% month over month and expect to get away with it.
Of course, the author also seems to think that grocery prices are decreasing. How does he figure that? They have increased by 5.3% compared to last year’s baseline according to the figures the author provided.
In the end, it would seem reading between the lines that these high prices are expected to be here to stay. The open question is whether people can actually afford to pay them.
Klawans, Justin. “2023: the year of sticker shock.” THE WEEK US, 14 December 2023,
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