Rummaging through a kitchen drawer for a pen that would write, I came across a Sobey's bill from two years ago. Butter, $3.99 a pound. "What did we just pay yesterday?" "$5.75," came the wifely reply. "They had a thief-in-the-night deal."In other words, a 44% increase in two years. That wasn't the worst of it: The $2.99 grapefruit juice is now $5.49 (88%). But a hurricane in Florida can do that. The butter is core inflation, courtesy of the Trudeau Liberals. Plus, we can get by without grapefruit juice but us Brits haven't done without butter since 1949 when rationing ended. That means we're stuck paying it... as with the Kraft Dinner and hamburger helper.I will not bore the reader with further glimpses into the Hannaford larder. Suffice it to say that if you were instinctively underwhelmed by the revelation that 'inflation fell to 2.9% in January,' you had good reason to doubt the good news and had lots of good company.The Bank of Canada target is 2%, for one thing.But there was the prime minister, welcoming the news and cooing that a cut in the bank rate would be about right, about now.So, two quick fact checks.First, the Bank of Canada raised interest rates in an attempt to control the inflation sparked by excessive government borrowing — something like $700 billion since the Trudeau Liberals came to power in 2015. (Trudeau's borrowing follies did not start with COVID.) And they're still doing it.Second, that in turn has forced people renewing their mortgages into accepting frighteningly large monthly payments. This, along with rising rents occasioned by a housing shortage (sparked in turn by another massive federal fail in which Ottawa expands immigration in the middle of a housing shortage) is actually the biggest single driver of inflation. If you have to pay an extra $500 a month, whether it's rent or mortgage, you know what inflation is. Now you know that the Trudeau Liberals are the guys to thank.So, is 2.9% anything to celebrate?Well, it was better than December, which was 3.4%.However, the only thing that dropped the number in January was lower gasoline prices. Unfortunately, gas prices went back up again early in February, after an Indiana refinery unexpectedly shut down and caused a refining shortage. So now you know what to expect from the February numbers.Then on April 1, the Trudeau Liberals will raise the carbon tax again. This will spread right through the economy as suppliers — and supermarkets — pass it on to the poor old consumer.Buy now while prices last, I suppose.Bottom line, after you take out the hurricanes and the refinery shutdowns, you are left with the absolutely ruinous monetary policies of the Trudeau Liberals. And Sod's Law being what it is, the biggest inflationary increases will be in the things you can't do without, such as butter, not the ones you can.They can tell you all they like that inflation is coming down. The grocery bill rummaged from the kitchen drawer tells a different story. And as long as we're all rummaging, my next job is checking between the cushions of the couch. There could be quarters there.
Rummaging through a kitchen drawer for a pen that would write, I came across a Sobey's bill from two years ago. Butter, $3.99 a pound. "What did we just pay yesterday?" "$5.75," came the wifely reply. "They had a thief-in-the-night deal."In other words, a 44% increase in two years. That wasn't the worst of it: The $2.99 grapefruit juice is now $5.49 (88%). But a hurricane in Florida can do that. The butter is core inflation, courtesy of the Trudeau Liberals. Plus, we can get by without grapefruit juice but us Brits haven't done without butter since 1949 when rationing ended. That means we're stuck paying it... as with the Kraft Dinner and hamburger helper.I will not bore the reader with further glimpses into the Hannaford larder. Suffice it to say that if you were instinctively underwhelmed by the revelation that 'inflation fell to 2.9% in January,' you had good reason to doubt the good news and had lots of good company.The Bank of Canada target is 2%, for one thing.But there was the prime minister, welcoming the news and cooing that a cut in the bank rate would be about right, about now.So, two quick fact checks.First, the Bank of Canada raised interest rates in an attempt to control the inflation sparked by excessive government borrowing — something like $700 billion since the Trudeau Liberals came to power in 2015. (Trudeau's borrowing follies did not start with COVID.) And they're still doing it.Second, that in turn has forced people renewing their mortgages into accepting frighteningly large monthly payments. This, along with rising rents occasioned by a housing shortage (sparked in turn by another massive federal fail in which Ottawa expands immigration in the middle of a housing shortage) is actually the biggest single driver of inflation. If you have to pay an extra $500 a month, whether it's rent or mortgage, you know what inflation is. Now you know that the Trudeau Liberals are the guys to thank.So, is 2.9% anything to celebrate?Well, it was better than December, which was 3.4%.However, the only thing that dropped the number in January was lower gasoline prices. Unfortunately, gas prices went back up again early in February, after an Indiana refinery unexpectedly shut down and caused a refining shortage. So now you know what to expect from the February numbers.Then on April 1, the Trudeau Liberals will raise the carbon tax again. This will spread right through the economy as suppliers — and supermarkets — pass it on to the poor old consumer.Buy now while prices last, I suppose.Bottom line, after you take out the hurricanes and the refinery shutdowns, you are left with the absolutely ruinous monetary policies of the Trudeau Liberals. And Sod's Law being what it is, the biggest inflationary increases will be in the things you can't do without, such as butter, not the ones you can.They can tell you all they like that inflation is coming down. The grocery bill rummaged from the kitchen drawer tells a different story. And as long as we're all rummaging, my next job is checking between the cushions of the couch. There could be quarters there.
