Stock Your Larder or Risk Starving

There is no doubt in anyone’s mind groceries have risen in price.  Just this week, my usual grocery basket of food cost me just over $300 when only two years ago it cost me roughly $150 for the same amount of items.  No cookie, cakes, chips, or other assorted goodies even graced my basket, just the essentials.  There were not even any paper goods, either, such as toilet paper, napkins, and tissues.  When talking with a good friend about how much my measly load cost me, she pondered if the reason for all of her friends weight gain was somehow a sign that food was going to become scarce and/or unaffordable in the near future.

You are probably thinking I am a kook right about now, but am I?  Remember when a box of pasta was 16 ounces?  I realized this week pasta is only 13.25 ounces now.  When I was a teen-ager making tuna casserole, the tuna cans contained 7 ounces, now it is 5 ounces.  Prices are going up and packaged food is shrinking.  If that’s not enough to bother you, think about the increase in gas prices, which the Democrats want to continue to see escalate.

Obama, Biden, and his cronies’ think gas prices should be $10/gallon.  When one thinks about the impact of how $10 per gallon of gas would affect our economy, it becomes both scary and nauseating.  Costs for manufacturing and shipping food goods would sky rocket.  When you begin to factor in the increased cost that a manufacturer would incur to have a building up and running, the increased costs for materials and shipping, it is going to be unbearable for the end consumer to be able to afford basic products.  The escalation of raw material and fuel cost will force some companies to close, as they can no longer sell products above their breakeven cost of production.  (In the recent Democrat Convention, many of the constituents said they believe that it is wrong for companies to make profit at all.)  As more companies close, it will increase demand for the products of those companies that remain, thus allowing them to increase their cost further.

In addition to the lingering possibility of gas reaching $10 per gallon, our country’s credit rating has just been downgraded once again and the Federal Reserve just keeps printing more and more money.  It continues to inject money into the economy by purchasing mortgage securities.  Printing and continuing to lend money to the United States so they can continue to incur more debt leads to a devalued dollar.  As the dollar becomes worth less, inflation increases because it takes more of your money to buy the same product as you did a year ago. Combine this with an increase in gasoline prices to $10/gallon and everyone is in a world of hurt just trying to sustain themselves.

More people are receiving Social Security Benefits than at any other time in our history; unemployment is at an all time high (especially once you factor in the unemployed people who gave up looking), and costs for goods and services are steadily creeping higher and higher.  In the last fiscal year, the U.S. government spent a record amount of Social Security disability benefits.  This fiscal year, our country surpassed last year’s record disability benefits in the first 11 months of the fiscal year.  The government has to get its money for these benefits from either higher tax revenue or by borrowing more money.

Is it time to stock your larder?  If you plan on voting for Obama, I would answer a definite “yes” if he gets another four years in office.  Stocking your pantry with beans, rice, canned goods, flour, and other essentials may be the only thing to keep you from starving.  I am stocking my larder and pantry plumb full.  Maybe I am being pessimistic, but I sure will be happy if I’m right.  And, if I am wrong and hyperinflation doesn’t assault our country, I can still use the food to feed my family.