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[quote]Jeff: I'm one of those anal people who saves receipts; but thankfully I usually throw them out after a few years when I discard old tax returns. I recently came across a Sam's Club receipt from 2008 and compared it to the most recent one (7/17/2012). Several items are of interest over the 4 year period: Folgers 2 lb Classic Roast: from $6.28 to $12.48 1 1/2 dozen extra large eggs: from $0.98 to $1.87 3 liter ExVirg Olive Oil: from $7.89 to $14.75 For these 3 basic items, the increase over 4 years was 92%, or 23%/year. I can live with this, but I fear that the next grab will be via property tax escalations to bail out the massive underfunded pension liabilities of local jurisdictions. That combined with $6.00 gas (definitely coming)means that in addition to PMs, we all are going to need guns and ammo when the riots start. [/quote] Thanks a lot for the data Apberusdisvet! You would THINK that with all I have to say about inflation that I would have thought about hanging onto some old receipts myself (lol). The numbers don't surprise me at all. While some food items have gone up less than that in price, some have gone up much more. I would have been especially interested to note prices for bread and/or pasta - since those are two of the food items which have REALLY soared in price in my neck of the woods, being grain-based products. Much of our meat is no longer even sold by the pound. Rather you can buy "$10 packs" (they don't even call them "family packs" any more, because there may not be enough meat for a whole family). And of course the GREAT thing about charging a FIXED price for a quantity of meat only noted in tiny print is that they can steadily reduce the QUANTITY of meat (while leaving the price the same). In other words, just like we have "shrinking" cereal boxes, yogurt containers, and even loaves of bread (as a means of passing along HIDDEN price increases); now retailers have even found a way for meat to "shrink". Obviously we can't blame our local supermarkets. They're just trying to survive, and they certainly didn't CAUSE these high prices themselves. Unfortunately they CONTRIBUTE to the problem. If our food retailers didn't do so much to HIDE price-increases in food then (ultimately) our GOVERNMENTS would take more and more heat - since THEY (and their bankster buddies) are responsible for exploding food prices...or rather the PLUMMETING value of our paper. - Jeff Nielson