My works canteen has upped prices again today - increases are about 5%, which is probably about the normal annual increase.

However in the last year we have;

petrol up ~10%
council tax up 10%+
electricity up 20%+
gas up 40%+
car tax up 6%
cinema ticket up 15% (now £6.80 )
etc etc

My weekly shop comes to slightly more than it did a year ago, and yet the Government claim inflation is running at only 2%??!!!

Increases like this have been going on for a good few years, and seem to be continuing.

Is it only me seeing these increases - and is everyone else only noticing things go up by 2%?!!

This has been mentioned before. The government use their own selective figures, as published in the newpapers earlier this year. They had a list of products that have mostly went down in price, all items that nobody ever buys.

Nope, my wage hasnt increased this year

or things that you would only buy once every X years, like a TV or MP3 player.

Mark

Hello

Yes, everything has been slowly creeping up. Small things, like drink and food have certainly been increasing a few pence here and there but it adds up over the course of the year to at least 10%.

Things like televisions and other technology items decrease in price and do offset the price rises (from a statistical perspective).

Steve

Had a meeting last week, no wage increase this year Filled up with petrol last night and noticed petrol is £101.9 a litre

I have noticed that petrol has gone up by around 5-6 p per litre in the last 10 days at several garages i know/use!

pack of polos used to be 12p. paid something like 39 in a petrol garage last week!

Clothes are much cheaper. Food prices have been static-ish for a while. Weighted for what we spend, overall inflation (ex housing) has been low. But yes, things have gone up in price, like they have pretty much every year since the war.

Yes but just recently prices seem to be going up rather steeply, it's not just a few % here and there is it!

How much longer before people find they are no longer able to support themselves on a decent waged job?!

People's expectations of what a decent standard of living means is very different now... disposable everything, trendy clothes for toddlers, everyone's got to have a mobile and an ipod.

But I think the biggest factor, certainly where I live in London, is that people can't afford a house. I'm not convinced general non-house inflation is such a big deal though... in fact, the low general inflation rates mean that big mortgages will take longer than ever to pay off.

We seem to keep upping our DD for power & gas every few months and still the amount we owe keeps going up every bill. May just have to write a cheque out to get things back on track.

I think the bigger problem is that people are totally unable to manage costs or spend money properly. They think that by increasing the price or adding new taxes is a panacea to fix all the problems. There is so much unchecked spending in both government and larger corporations.

You need £30,000pa just to survive in London these days, that can't be right.

Surely it cant be right to get the economy this far out of sync?

Things like house prices and all utility bills should be included in inflation figures really - then inflation would increase, hence interest rates would go up and this would put the brakes on the rises, and prevent any booms.

As the inflation figures used are unrealisically low then whats going to happen??...

Count yourself lucky i aint had a pay increase in 4 years

In that case you've had a pay cut for the last 4 years.

Time to move on !

Clothes Cheaper

Food Cheaper

Interest Rates still Low

We have never had it better!!!!

Pete

But then if the interest rates go up further people are going to be even more hard pushed to get a mortgage, with repayments going up from every month, mostly affecting ftb's or those with a large new mortgage ?!?

Clothes are cheaper because big corporation now get them made in China or Eastern Europe.

Food is cheaper because big corporations control the market (ie: the supermarkets)

Interest rates will rise.

But then if the inflation figure was real, interest rates would have gone up as a result of inflation being high and this would have prevented the housing boom.

So repayments would be higher interest, but property prices would be lower.

That's true, but the goods still cost less than they did 10 years ago, very unusually in C20th historical terms. Some people have a subjective experience that's different, but the headline rate of inflation isn't an underestimate overall. It is what it is, and it's calculation is pretty transparent. Some goods and services cost more, others cost less... I think the premise of the thread that things are sneakily more expensive is wide of the mark.

Food, clothes, holidays... a big chunk of most households' expenditure. A recent spike in gas prices doesn't counteract 10 years of falling prices in those sectors.

But now its too late for that, theres no way back -

For the first time she can recall, the bank that my wife works at wrote no new business one day last week.

One to two years ago, she didn't have enough hours in the day to fit everybody in who either wanted a loan or to take some equity out of their property.

The days of propping up the economy with loans and re-mortgages are all but over.

GREED.Its what runs our country now,especially the southern part.

Greed combined with stupidity.

And may i add "a lack of responsibility or thought for their actions just good solid vote getting sound bites"

My wages only went up 18%

Taxation. Less and less loop holes, and more and more overcharging by the IR ,and unessercery overpayments to the IR by halfwit accountants. Resulting in companies large and small increasing prices and cutting wages to maintain overheads.

That is the rot of this country, obviously if government spending was controlled and resourced in an intelligent way, taxation could be put to good use or even cut, then nobody would need to pay so much tax, and thus the circles of price hikes could be broken. Never going to happen though, the only way out is a good recession.

I thought / would guess that a lot of it is to do with the massive rise in oil price over the last few years - used to be $30 a barrel, then hit $60. All those goods have to be transported to the shops somehow, and it ain't by pedal power.

See? Even filling your tank now costs the price of a MY96 classic