Gatorade Break
It's fairly obvious by now that market participants doubt seriously the idea that the Fed is prepared to risk its inflation-fighting credentials in the service of whatever good might come of allowing the US economy to run super-hot for any length of time.
June CPI came in scorching. Yes, you can still plausibly claim "transitory" if you're so inclined, but the monthly gain on core underscored the notion that liftoff will be brought forward.
"Yet another blowout inflation reading makes it incre
Excellent observation. Thanks
Regarding your visit to the grocer… I saw that same guy in a grocery store several years ago, though his daughter was not there at the time. I don’t encourage smoking, H, but I would have bought the cashier a pack of cigarettes, just on an impulse to offer a small form of support. I get your point about the meritocracy. No doubt about it.
I was in college during Jimmy Carter’s presidency when inflation was 20%. After classes I rode the train downtown to work part time in a company mailroom, but could not stop thinking about how my paltry paycheck would buy less with each passing day.
Few had wealth in the late 70’s. To my view, wealth was in the hands of company ownership, the church, and prominent attorneys. So I reckoned the parade of people trudging through the Chicago snow to catch the train home did not perceive great differences among themselves. And in that train, jammed elbow to elbow, wheels loudly screeching through the subway, people did not look at each other. It was not pretty, and neither was it pleasant. But we were all trying to get somewhere. We all had our homes, and private ambitions, and reasons to pursue them.
Despite the close confinement on the train, we were courteous to each other and abided as comfortably as possible in the tight space. Being just a college kid, green, and part-timer, I marveled at these people who worked all day. I didn’t know what they did for their work. But I admired them. I thought they had a type of dignity that I had not seen so clearly in my suburban upbringing.
Years later, on vacation when I saw the guy in the grocery store, I said nothing to him because it would have done no good. Whatever the reason, whether fatigue, irritation, or ignorance, he acted without courtesy or any apparent grace. If meritocracy had anything to do with this guy’s behavior, it is indeed an ugly outcome of our collective evolution. But if that is the case, I can’t control it. And I wonder if it may be attributable to broader, still-ongoing reordering.
Not long from now we won’t have cashiers in grocery stores. Bezos has already implemented this in some places. It won’t be long before having a cashier to check us out from a store will be an exception to common practice. Furthermore, the pandemic and its effects on human connection seem to be hastening changes of this kind. Of course, we can also order groceries to be delivered (as my wife and I did during the past year). During the pandemic, we also ordered cat food and litter, and home office furniture. We have been ordering from Amazon since the time when Bezos was personally sealing and labeling the packages.
Like the guy on my vacation, I can become gruff on a bad day, not my own best example of humanity. But for the most part I value courtesy. And I am naturally curious when I meet a human person in any setting. I’ll say hello and interact. However, the changes that continue unabated in our society and affect the manner and frequency of our interaction cause me to wonder: Where to from here? Will we be less inclined to exercise our humanity because the opportunity won’t present itself as frequently? Will we become mere persons, out there in the abstract, less human? I don’t know what that may look like, but it doesn’t sound good.
ChgoDave: Thanks. Nice addition to H’s anecdote. Enjoyed it.
“Furthermore, the pandemic and its effects on human connection seem to be hastening changes of this kind.”
Bingo – also likely will contribute to ultimately a disinflationary economic trend …
nice effort CD-
I’ve been in a few grocery store lines where some people quietly but not quietly enough cluck and complain or visibly sag and stir if there are any unfortunate souls ahead who are relying on SNAP benefits (and the common delays caused by confusion over qualifying items which are ridiculously specific and confusing). While we all wait, I see some of these same people auditing the purchase as it is being rung up and I overhear mutterings like “That’s an awful lot of Gatorade if you’re on welfare” and the reply that “You can pretty much just make your own Gatorade if you were tight on money.”