Rule number one.... Act as an individual in all aspects of life because this strategy will enable you to escape the inflation blackhole of collectivism [see photo]. Collectivism at its heart denies individual choice to consumers, voters, taxpayers, borrowers, etc. Collectivism is top down rule by corporates, politicians, retailers, and so on.
A recent example of what I am talking about here is my trip to the Tesco supermarket yesterday. I went to find some staples. The main one was milk. First thing is the milk I usually buy [home brand] was not on the shelves or I could not find it. Second the prices on the up brand milk were divided into two. A discounted price for Club Members and a 20% higher price for those like me who do not want to join this retailer's collective [a club that gives them access to your shopping data and more]. I walked out of the store for the first time in 8 years without purchasing anything. I walked to a smaller retailer where the quality of all goods are higher than at Tesco but so are the prices. There. I paid more for the one litre of milk that I purchased. I will now shop much more at these smaller retailers as my frontline strategy against collective inflation. I will pay more for my goods in future but I will buy less of the junk sold at Tesco and thus my standard of living will rise. Tesco serves collective wants rather than their individual needs.I am sure this is poor management decision at Tesco and that enterprise is therefore taking the first step on the slippery slope of decline.
Rule number two... Choose quality over quantity. Quantity was formerly known to produce lower prices for goods and services but today it is the seed source for consumer-led inflation.
Quantity is why consumers have row upon row of choice in potato chips including home brand offerings. Is the quality of potato chips different across the range of offerings in your local supermarket. I found that the quality of the potato chips in my small retailer is high and "perhaps" the much higher price of these is wanted if and only if you can adjust your consumption patterns to ensure you buy fewer of them. The rational I have adopted is that I will buy fewer potato chips but those will be better quality and therefore I will have to pay much higher prices for them. In sum... I choose to pay higher prices for quality goods and services and to level-up my new spending patterns to my budget I will consume less of these quality offerings than I did when I "settled" for what the quantity system sent my way.
Rule number three... Trust yourself, trust yourself, trust yourself.. Inflation is the result of mistrust which leads to corruption and ultimately to a diminution of standards. If you trust yourself then you will pursue higher and higher standards and that will protect you from the worst impacts of consumer inflation, corrupt institutions, energy/food shortages, and lower choice in both private and public goods.
In Prague where I live there is a huge problem looming with inflation and shortages especially in electricity and gas supplies. Food shortages are coming and I can see evidence of it appearing on the empty shelves in supermarkets. And in response to the pressures of today and those in prospect we had a huge protest downtown in Prague over the weekend.
Otto Eibl from Masaryk University Brno while speaking about the 70,000 who protested in Prague over the weekend said... “The biggest issue for the government now is to find a connection with those citizens who are not represented in Parliament... In this regard we should remember the results of the last Parliamentary elections. More than a million votes were lost. To a large extent, the political representation of these voters overlaps with that of the organisers of Saturday’s demonstration... These voters feel that they have been abandoned and they convince themselves of this every time they see the energy prices, the prices in the grocery stores, or when they read about their government’s generous support for Ukraine... These are the main reasons why they came to Prague and why they protested against the government.”
Richard.
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