When we think about price changes we often think of them in terms of the changes in the Consumer Price Index (CPI-U for all Urban Consumers). Looking at it that way, we may get the idea that price movements are monolithic i.e. that they all move together, so "prices" were up 2% or 5% or whatever, over the last 12 months. But that is a bit misleading since prices all move independently. For this reason, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics publishes a CPI database with a breakdown of all the various components. By analyzing the various components of the CPI over the last 20 years we developed the following Chart. Click Chart for larger image As we can see … [Read more...]
How Does Inflation Affect the Cost of Insurance?
What is Inflation and How does it Impact Insurance? Well, to understand the effects that inflation has on insurance, it is crucial to understand what inflation is. Generally, there are two types of inflation "Price inflation" and "Monetary inflation" (i.e. an increase in the money supply). Price inflation is primarily caused by monetary inflation. In this article, we will use the common meaning of inflation and refer to Inflation as a general rise in prices. To understand inflation's impact on insurance, we must first understand that insurance is a monetary instrument i.e. a contract generally between an individual and a company that involves a series of small payments from the … [Read more...]
Cost of Living: LA and New York vs. The World
Los Angeles When you think of a city with a "high cost of living" you might think of Los Angeles. After all, you've probably seen some HGTV show where Tarek and Christina or The Property Brothers buy a tiny old house for half a million dollars and it needs a ton of renovations just to make it livable! So LA has to be an expensive place to live... right? Well compared to New York... not so much. According to PayScale's Cost of Living Calculator the cost of living in New York, NY is actually 60% higher than Los Angeles. Looked at another way, even though the Cost of Living in LA is 48.0% above U.S. average, Los Angeles is still only the 9th most expensive city in the U.S. when it comes to … [Read more...]
Comparing the Cost of Living When Retiring (or Moving)
Most of us dream of the day we can retire and be free from the daily grind. Retirement offers us the opportunity to remake our lives and often we can choose to live almost anywhere. In years past that often meant moving to a a warmer climate like Florida or Arizona. One of the major considerations when choosing to relocate (whether for retirement or for a job) is the cost of living. Will your pension (or paycheck) cover your daily expenses? And that's where our Cost of Living Calculator comes in handy. It allows you to choose your starting location and your proposed destination and get a comparison between the two. For instance, suppose you are tired of the cold in Albany, N.Y. and … [Read more...]
Updated Inflation Adjusted Gasoline Price Chart
With the recent drop in gasoline prices perhaps you have begun to wonder exactly how close to historical lows are we? If so we have updated our famous Inflation Adjusted Gasoline Price Chart. It shows where we stand on an inflation adjusted basis. Lowest Inflation Adjusted Price of Gasoline was $1.46 in 1998 Back in 1918 gasoline was $0.25 a gallon and by 1932 prices had fallen to 18 cents a gallon! But as we all know over the last 100 years the purchasing power of the dollar has fallen drastically so in order to get the true picture we can’t just say that the lowest price of gas was 18 cents per gallon, we need to adjust the price for inflation. When adjusting for inflation there are … [Read more...]
Gasoline Taxes by State
Yesterday we looked at the BLS' release of the July Inflation numbers and that lead to a discussion of gasoline prices and the correlation between high gas prices and politics. The first thing we looked at was the graphic of gasoline prices by state. And then we looked at the political landscape based on the percentage of the state that voted Democrat or Republican. We looked at the following graphic and noted that "the more blue the more Democrat and the more red the more Republican (which by the way is backwards compared to the rest of the world) and incidentally almost exactly backwards for the gasoline chart as well. There appears to be a very high correlation between high gas … [Read more...]
Living Longer: Health Care, Life Insurance and Retirement Costs for U.S. Citizens
At first glance, one would tend to assume that living longer is a blessing. One gets to spend more time enjoying the company of loved ones, see grandchildren grow up, etc.. However, it’s also worth wondering how current standards of longevity for U.S. citizens tie in with the hefty costs of medical care, the issue of purchasing life insurance, and the cost of retiring. Let's take a look at how much we’re actually spending on health care compared to other countries, how longer lives impact our life insurance premiums, and whether or not we should all just find a different country to retire to. Health Care Costs in the U.S. Obamacare was definitely not the first time the issue of health care … [Read more...]
How States Stack Up
If you have ever considered moving to improve your income or lifestyle the following info-graphic might help clarify your choices. It covers median household income by state ( the yellow states have the highest median income and the orange states have the lowest). It also covers Housing costs, number of millionaires, poverty rate, well being index, employment rate, tax burden, minimum wage and GDP. By clicking on an individual state you can see all its results at once in the right hand column. See also: Cost of Living, State Employment and Unemployment Rates and Minimum Wages vs Unemployment. … [Read more...]
Inflation: America’s #1 Export
What’s America’s No. 1 Export? by Bill Bonner In 1950 the typical working man was able to support a family. Today he can barely support himself because the costs of his main expenses have gone way up. He has to work about twice as long to pay for a new car and a new house. Health care is worse. In 1950 the cost per person per year was about $100. According to the government’s numbers, prices today are about 10 times higher. So health care should cost about $1,000. Not even close. It’s $9,000. In 1950 the typical father earned about $60 a week. For a family of four, he had to work fewer than seven weeks to cover the year’s health care expenses. Today how much does he earn? We’ve … [Read more...]
Highest Grossing Movies Adjusted for Inflation
Traditionally, war films, musicals and historical dramas have been the most popular genres and Gone With the Wind held the record of highest-grossing film for 25 years but doesn't even make it into the top fifty in the modern market. But purchasing power varies widely over the time period since Gone With the Wind was first released in 1939. But the true key to determining how revenues really compare is when you adjust them for inflation. Highest-grossing films (Nominal) First we will look at nominal gross box office revenues. That is the actual number of dollars (not adjusted for inflation) earned strictly in the box office. Modern films have an advantage because in addition to box office … [Read more...]
