#cpi inflation calculator

[techav]

So I was curious —

$1.00 each in quantities of 1000 in 1977. That's about $5.19 each in 2023.

A quick search on DigiKey, and today Red rectangular through-hole LEDs can be had for under $0.08 each in quantities of 1000.

That's the equivalent of about $0.02 each in 1977.

1977

[cantsayidont]

July 1941. Although she didn't become Hawkgirl until after this story in FLASH COMICS #19, Shiera Sanders was a regular presence in the Golden Age Hawkman strip from the start as Carter Hall's girlfriend and helper. In this story, he's bet her a dinner that he can wrap up the case within a week, which of course he does, to her dismay:

If you're wondering why Shiera looks so sick here, the CPI Inflation Calculator says $35 USD in mid-1941 is the equivalent of $730 USD now. Luckily, Carter, who is very rich, is not a complete ass:

It's not very clear in these stories what if anything Shiera does for a living. She and Carter are not married in any of their Golden Age appearances, and in principle they aren't living together, although in later stories, she's sometimes at his place for breakfast.

[andmaybegayer]

oh cool, GNU units now has US bureau of labour CPI stats so you can do inflation calculations easily.

[centrally-unplanned]

Real wages may have gone up, but I think rent growth and housing cost has outpaced inflation?

I don’t have a source, but my impression is that people are making more money and further from being able to acquire housing, at least in my information bubble.

rent is too damn high guy strikes again

granted, Trump is going to make it worse, but I don’t think people think about that. They look at the rent, they get mad, they vote against incumbents.

hot take: Walz VP pick was actually really good, I think Kamala significantly outperformed my expectations in the Midwest swing states despite losing anyway. Nobody will know for sure, but two coastal dems would’ve been a much worse look.

as an aside, I feel an absolutely instinctive level revulsion and distrust of JD Vance, and it’s wild that nobody else seems to notice. The guy is the one of the most transparently evil Yaley strivers I’ve ever seen, and people just fall for his massaged backstory without a second thought.

I think trump will do a bad job as president, but Vance and Thiel et. al. are actually dangerous

So "real wages" are a calculation of nominal wage increases that are ratio'd to increases in the prices of a basket of goods that households typically buy. That basket includes housing! It is about ~1/3rd of the CPI basket, and it changes as prices do. That doesn't mean "Real wages may have gone up, but I think rent growth and housing cost has outpaced inflation?" can't be true in a proportional sense - rent can be going up disproportionately and consuming a larger share, for example - but if rent was going up *so* much as to eat 100% of the wage gains....then real wages would not be going up. The calculation would show a decline.

Still, I get what you are saying - the housing market got incredibly hot in ~2022, and I think that is a big part of voter dissatisfaction. But two caveats on that. The first is that the majority of Americans own their home. That is most people's primary investment vehicle. So when housing prices go up for them...they benefit, they don't lose. 50% of the country got richer from that! No statement here on the economic justice or efficacy implications - I am only saying that elections are won by majorities. In this case, I think you can say people are often economically having their complaint cake and eating it too - they blame Biden for the increased grocery prices, but love that their house is now worth 20% more but don't give the admin any credit for that to offset the blame.

The other is that people rent and sell to consumers who buy homes. Housing in America is not being "left off the market by greedy speculators" or whatever, it is being bought by people to live in them, with money that they have. To the extent that "housing prices are going up" it is because american households are much richer and are putting that money into housing. If they weren't, the prices would go down.

Again, the economic justice angle is not my point - here I am quite confident that the specific dynamics of the housing market involved significant hardship for lower income Americans in a bunch of regions. Just again, elections are based on majorities, and the majority of Americans are not struggling to afford housing.

(I agree that this was politically rough for the dems of course! Just to make that clear)

[sztupy]

Zoopla found that in London, first-time buyers would typically need a household income of £103,000.

In Wales, they would need £38,800 and in Scotland an income of £31,500 would be needed, according to the calculations.

Ezért költözik ide az összes angol

[beardedmrbean]

A new cost of living adjustment (COLA) prediction for Social Security has many seniors scratching their heads at how they'll stretch their benefits amid inflation.

The Senior Citizens League (TSCL) just predicted the COLA for 2025, saying beneficiaries can expect a 2.66 percent bump in benefits. Earlier in the year, the estimate was set at 2.6 and 2.4 percent.

If a 2.66 percent boost is implemented, it would likely increase monthly payments by around $50 for most recipients.

While the jump in monthly benefits would be better than the earlier predictions, many seniors were expecting a higher boost to deal with the impacts of inflation.

The Social Security Administration adjusts Social Security payment amounts every year based on the consumer price index, but not everyone feels the change would be enough to get by.

"While COLA payments will increase to offset the effects of inflation, the problem many have with the potential percentage jump is it won't get far enough to meet most of the financial needs of seniors," Alex Beene, a financial literacy instructor at the University of Tennessee at Martin, told Newsweek. "Obviously daily expenses for this age group continue to rise, but the uptick in healthcare costs are putting an additional strain on them, and COLA payments may not be enough to match that uptick."

Seniors will also likely be dealing with higher Medicare Part premiums, according to TSCL.

In the Medicare Trustee report from this month, Part B premiums were predicted to grow by $10.30 a month to a total of $185. That increase is on top of nationwide inflation on groceries, housing and transportation.

"For 2024, the average Social Security benefit rose by $50 and after subtracting $9.80 to cover Medicare Part B Premium increases, the total change in benefits came out to just $40.20 a month. With the forecast of a 2.66 percent COLA for 2025, it appears seniors will continue to suffer financial insecurity as much next year as they have this year," Shannon Benton, executive director of TSCL, said in a statement.

The COLA for each year depends on the rise of the consumer price index for urban wage earners and clerical workers (CPI-W) for the third quarter of the last year. That means the official COLA for 2025 won't be calculated until later in the year.

Many finance experts have questioned whether the CPI-W even stands as a good measure of what seniors can expect inflation wise, with many saying the consumer price index for the elderly (CPI-E)

In 2024, Social Security checks rose by 3.2 percent due to the COLA after a more generous increase of 8.7 percent last year. Many seniors, roughly 71 percent, reported in TSCL 2024 Senior Survey that the increase in household costs they saw went beyond the 3.2 percent jump from the COLA.

"The majority of seniors still feel like their costs are rising faster than those annual adjustments," Michael Ryan, a finance expert and founder/CEO of michaelryanmoney.com, told Newsweek. "So while the COLA certainly helps, it often still doesn't fully cover the real inflation draining seniors' buying power."

Due to the insufficient funds from Social Security for seniors, many will need additional income streams, including a 401(k), IRA or other investment accounts.

"At the end of the day, any COLA increase is better than none to prevent total Social Security stagnation," Ryan said. "But the 2.6 percent projection for 2025 underscores the need for policymakers to reexamine whether metrics like CPI-E would better serve seniors by more accurately reflecting their unique spending habits. We just want to make sure government benefits retain as much purchasing power over time as possible on those fixed incomes."

[72-votes]

🦞SAVE LARRY, KILL LARRY🦞

The 1988 poll to kill Batman's child sidekick, Robin, was inspired by an early example of interactive television: a 1982 Saturday Night Live stunt starring Eddie Murphy and a live lobster.

The April 10, 1982 Saturday Night Live show opened with a chef grabbing a live lobster from its tank, making it dance while humming the Star Wars theme, and then laughing while lowering it into a pot of boiling water. Just before the lobster was placed into the pot, Eddie Murphy appeared, grabbed the lobster out from the way of certain death, and turned to address the audience.

Rather than being boiled alive without protest, Larry the Lobster's fate was submitted to the arena of popular opinion and disposable money. The show's audience was presented with two premium-rate "900" phone numbers"—one for those who wanted to spare Larry, and another for those who wanted to see it boiled alive. Each call cost $0.50, and each caller could call multiple times.

The lobster's televised ordeal can be seen below in a compilation video. (Warning for human cruelty toward an animal.)

Updates on the vote count were given by other cast members throughout the live broadcast; by the end of the show, viewers had made over 400,000 calls. Ultimately the "Save Larry" supporters managed a narrow win against the "Kill Larry" supporters.

To kill a Robin

The SNL stunt stuck with DC Comics editor Denny O'Neil, and he proposed to fellow editor Jenette Kahn that they could reserve a similar stunt for killing off a high-profile DC Comics character. By the time of 1988, Batman's colorful child sidekick Robin had been considered a divisive character among the creative forces behind Batman and among Batman fans. After Batman writer Jim Starlin's unsuccessful campaign to kill off Robin in a HIV/AIDS storyline, O'Neil decided the problematic Robin was the perfect candidate for a "Larry the Lobster" stunt. Sales manager John Pope began calling AT&T to secure the two 900 numbers on October 1, 1987; it took him until March 1988 to reserve them.

Like in Larry's case, the voting results were extremely close. Unlike Larry, the outcome supported Robin's death over his survival.

Fun facts!

Larry the Lobster predates Jason Todd's existence. "Larry the Lobster" aired on 10 April 1982. Jason Todd first appeared in the Batman comic in 1983, and he made his first appearance as Robin several months later. This might add credence to the idea that the idea for a DC Comics death poll wasn't specifically conceived with Robin in mind.

Within a span of a single SNL show, a total of 466,548 premium-rate calls were made to decide Larry's fate.

Within a span of 35 hours, a total of

At a cost of $0.50 per call, callers spent a total of $233,274.00 on Larry's poll. (After adjusting for inflation since 1982, this amount would be about $751,420.05 in 2023 dollars.)

At a cost of $0.50 per call, callers spent a total of $5,307 on Robin's poll. (After adjusting for inflation since 1988, this amount would be about $13,541.75 in 2023 dollars.)

Larry was spared by a margin of 11,644 votes. These votes cost a total of $5,822.00.

Robin was condemned to death by a margin of 72 votes. These votes cost a total of $36.00.

Both polls were decided by a margin of less than 1%.

A lobster's probable end

In the aftermath of the sketch, Murphy received letters protesting Larry's treatment. One letter made a racist jab at Murphy: "that man is sick, and I thought those people didn't like seafood."

To spite this racist comment, Murphy ensured that Larry's stay of execution was only temporary.

Credits

Thanks to the Internet Archive @internetarchive for access to old SNL episodes. https://archive.org/details/saturday-night-live-s-07-e-16-daniel-j-travanti-john-cougar-mellencamp

"Larry the Lobster" on Wikipedia

"A Death in the Family" (comics) on Wikipedia

CPI Inflation Calculator https://data.bls.gov/cgi-bin/cpicalc.pl

[mightyflamethrower]

Joe Did That: Inflation Costs Americans an Extra $1000 Monthly

CATHERINE SALGADO | 5:14 PM ON APRIL 12, 2024

Thanks to the wonders of Bidenomics, the average American is spending over a thousand dollars extra a month. Fortunately, Biden is focused on important things — like funding jihad supporters in Gaza and paying off student loans with taxpayer money the government cannot spare.

Fox Business highlighted the $1,069 cost increase compared to three years ago before Joe Biden’s disastrous economic policies drove up inflation higher than Hunter Biden smoking Parmesan cheese. Inflation has allegedly fallen since 2022, but the context for that statement is that inflation is still rising, just at a supposedly slower rate — inflation went up about 18% under Biden. You still have to shell out more money for the basic costs of living than you did two or three years ago, which is why Americans are increasingly burdened with credit card debt.

As of February, two-thirds of full-time American workers said that their income had not kept pace with inflation. Real wages have been steadily dropping since Biden took office.

From Fox Business:

The typical U.S. household needed to pay $227 more a month in March to purchase the same goods and services it did one year ago because of still-high inflation, according to calculations from Moody's Analytics chief economist Mark Zandi shared with FOX Business. Americans are paying on average $784 more each month compared with the same time two years ago and $1,069 more compared with three years ago, before the inflation crisis began… when compared with January 2021, shortly before the inflation crisis began, prices remain up a stunning 18.94%.

Food, child care, and rent — the necessities — are devastatingly expensive under the Biden administration. Fox quoted Bright MLS chief economist Lisa Sturtevant, “Inflation has not just stalled, but it is moving in the wrong direction.” Unfortunately, low-income Americans — those who can least afford to spend more — are of course hardest hit by rising costs.

The Consumer Price Index (CPI), which measures the costs of what is supposed to be a representative “basket of goods,” continues to be well above the rate that the U.S. had before the economically damaging COVID-19 pandemic, Fox explained. The necessities mentioned above (food, rent, child care) are significantly more expensive than they were just a year ago. 

“Housing and gasoline costs were the biggest drivers of inflation last month, accounting for more than half of the total monthly increase,” Fox added. Food and auto insurance costs also went up, with the latter at a sobering 22.2% increase over the same time in 2023. Inflation is causing Americans to use up savings and increasingly rack up credit card debt to meet expenses, a situation that is both risky and unsustainable.

Credit card debt in America reached a new record high by the end of December 2023, Fox Business noted, citing data from the New York Federal Reserve.

Bidenomics has been nothing but a catastrophe for ordinary Americans, costing them ever more money even as their real wages decrease.

[iampjr]

RT @KaironLabs: 1/4 With Last week's new #CPI calculation method. CPI still came in showing over expectations - signaling that #inflation is picking up again. #cryptomarketmaker #cryptocurrencies #alt #Ethereum #USDT #CryptoInvestor #CryptoInvestor https://t.co/b0zLRTryYk

RT @KaironLabs: 1/4 With Last week’s new #CPI calculation method. CPI still came in showing over expectations – signaling that #inflation is picking up again. #cryptomarketmaker #cryptocurrencies #alt #Ethereum #USDT #CryptoInvestor #CryptoInvestor https://t.co/b0zLRTryYk — Patrick Rooney (@patrickrooney) Feb 20, 2023 https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js from Twitter…

[ausetkmt]

People's World: NYC Uber drivers stage one-day strike over company robbery of $12M in raises

NEW YORK—Some 80,000 low-wage mostly immigrant New York City Uber drivers staged a one-day strike on Jan. 5 over the firm’s robbery of an estimated $12 million in raises the city’s Taxi and Limousine Commission ordered for them.

At a noontime rally at Uber headquarters at 175 Greenwich St., in downtown Manhattan, the drivers explained the city panel, following local law enacted in 2018, ordered a raise for them of at least $1,000 per driver per month, starting Dec. 19, 2022.

Including mileage reimbursements for skyrocketing gasoline expenses, the Uber drivers calculate they’ve lost $12 million. In addition to the strike, the drivers also asked customers to turn off the Uber app on their cell phones in solidarity through midnight.

Uber got a preliminary injunction to stop the raises ordered by the city—prompting a prior one-day drivers’ strike the day they were due to take effect, the 19th. The second strike precedes a Jan. 6 state Supreme Court hearing in Manhattan. In court, the commission is defending its raise for the drivers.

“Uber is trying to steal our raises from us. We aren’t going to let that happen,” responded driver Samassa Tidiane ahead of the rally.

The city’s Uber drivers, like their colleagues driving for the ride-share firm elsewhere in the U.S., are among the millions of exploited, low-wage fed-up workers from coast to coast who have had it with corporate greed at their expense.

Other such groups of workers include adjunct professors, port truckers, retail workers, warehouse workers, Amazon workers, and various “gig economy” workers. Those workers’ activism has led to large increases in union organizing and in employer-forced strikes. Other low-wage workers have just plain left for better jobs.

The commission-ordered raise for Uber drivers is supposed to cover inflation according to the Consumer Price Index for urban consumers’ transportation. That transportation index has skyrocketed since the first commission decision setting pay and reimbursement rates for the drivers, according to a friend-of-the-court brief the union-backed New York Taxi Workers Alliance filed with the judge.

In the brief, Uber driver Lamin Jatta said he told the city commission he used to pay $30 to fill up his tank and now pays $60. He wanted the panel to use “a consumer price that measures drivers’ professional expenses.” Driver Xavier Koudougou asked the commission “to use a CPI that reflects driver expenses because we drivers are consumer[s], but we use more gas than regular driver[s] and when the gas price [is] high, they have options. But we don’t.”

But after the commission approved the raise, Uber got the temporary injunction against it. The results: The drivers have had no raise at all, and their pay has not only fallen behind inflation but it’s also left many financially underwater. Many don’t even make the city’s minimum wage. So they’ve staged one-day strikes on Dec. 19 and on Jan. 5.

The Taxi Workers Alliance brief backing the Uber drivers lays out the impact in stark terms. So did the drivers, in statements before the noontime rally.“I’m shocked and speechless thinking of how Uber stopped our raise after all the hearings and all the protests we did,” said Uber driver Nusrat Jahan, a Taxi Workers Alliance member. “This raise was like a small light of happiness for our families and for us, which Uber didn’t let happen.

“I’m ashamed Uber blocked this happiness before the holidays. Now I’m working for Uber raising all this money for them so they can hire a private jet or go to a private island or go to Dubai to celebrate their happiness with their families. We could have been earning $1,000 extra a month to pay our bills, not for luxuries.”

“We won raises from the Taxi and Limousine Commission, but Uber decided to go to a judge to stop our raises. Uber doesn’t think about the drivers, they just think about themselves,” added Tidiane, also a Taxi Workers Alliance member.

“We’re suffering because car payments, insurance, food, gas, and mechanic prices are all going up. If Uber was the one paying expenses for cars and gas, they would have raised the prices a long time ago, but it’s drivers who pay for everything out of pocket. Uber is trying to steal our raises from us. We aren’t going to let that happen.”

The Taxi Workers Alliance brief elaborated on the conditions the drivers face without the raise. It also noted that even with the commission’s hike, the raise still would not keep up with inflation the drivers face, or the costs of buying and maintaining their cars.

“The cost of everyday essentials, from bread and milk to rent, has increased due to inflation levels not seen in the past 40 years. Uber speaks of the choice it must make: Bear the cost itself—as a major multinational company—or pass it onto customers, in whole or in part, and potentially upset customers with higher fare pricing.

“The stark reality [is] that drivers have no choice…. They cannot increase what Uber charges for fares. They must pay and have already paid higher vehicle costs. They cannot pass the increased cost of cars, insurance, repairs, and fuel onto customers. And they cannot decrease Uber’s commission” from each fare.

Drivers “have seen their take-home pay drop precipitously. The results of such a decrease have immediate, human impact on drivers and their families who, beginning with a baseline of low-wage earnings, cannot make any more trade-offs. Indeed, the record reflects nearly 80% of drivers were already struggling to pay rent, and nearly 50% struggling to afford food.”

[leafatlas]

CPI base year revision: MOSPI floats discussion paper on treatment of PDS items & other free social transfers

Should free social transfers, as well as food grains provided under the public distribution system, be taken into account in India’s retail inflation calculation? This is the question the Department of Statistics is grappling with in its effort to revise the base year of the Consumer Price Index (CPI), update the weights of different items in the CPI basket and possibly improve the compilation…

[ericalto]

CPI annual base update: MOSPI floats discussion paper on treatment of PDS items and other free public transfers

Should free social transfers as well as grains provided under the public distribution system be included in India’s inflation calculations? This is the question faced by the Ministry of Statistics, in their efforts to update the base year in the Consumer Price Index (CPI) and to update the weights of the different items in the CPI basket and to improve the aggregation method. The CPI is an…

[third-new]

CPI Base Year Revision: MOSPI floats discussion paper on PDS items and other free social transfers

Should free social transfers as well as foodgrains provided under the public distribution system be included in the calculation of retail inflation in India? This is the question the Ministry of Statistics is grappling with to revise the base year for the Consumer Price Index (CPI) as well as update the weights for various items in the CPI basket and improve the compilation methodology. CPI is an…

[newtras]

CPI Base Year Revision: MOSPI floats discussion paper on PDS items and other free social transfers

Should free social transfers as well as foodgrains provided under the public distribution system be included in the calculation of retail inflation in India? This is the question the Ministry of Statistics is grappling with to revise the base year for the Consumer Price Index (CPI) as well as update the weights for various items in the CPI basket and improve the compilation methodology. CPI is an…

[newbizz]

CPI Base Year Revision: MOSPI floats discussion paper on PDS items and other free social transfers

Should free social transfers as well as foodgrains provided under the public distribution system be included in the calculation of retail inflation in India? This is the question the Ministry of Statistics is grappling with to revise the base year for the Consumer Price Index (CPI) as well as update the weights for various items in the CPI basket and improve the compilation methodology. CPI is an…

[satrthere]

CPI Base Year Revision: MOSPI floats discussion paper on PDS items and other free social transfers

Should free social transfers as well as foodgrains provided under the public distribution system be included in the calculation of retail inflation in India? This is the question the Ministry of Statistics is grappling with to revise the base year for the Consumer Price Index (CPI) as well as update the weights for various items in the CPI basket and improve the compilation methodology. CPI is an…