Just finished watching "Julie's Best Friend". S1. Ep 6. Ann walks in the door with one bag of groceries and complains it cost her $23, which is $95 in today's money. She proceeded to unload what was an 8 pack of Coke, some juice, some vegetables and 1 or 2 other things. I find that totally unbelievable.
shareAgreed!!!maybe that's why they were so lithe, LOL. All the Tab they drank back in the day. David saved the day with real food:)
shareDavid must have really had the hots for Ann, buying the family $106 in food, which is $441 in today's money!
shareShowing my age here, but I remember spending $25.00 on a week's worth of groceries back then.
shareIn 1976 I was making about 5 bucks an hour. Total with spouse about 9 bucks or so and doing well since we had no kids at the time. Married 5 years. Mortgage on older home for 12 years. Paid off in less than 10.
First gas lines had come and gone with resulting gas prices of about 50cents/gal. locally. Leaded gas was on the way out. Never understood why unleaded cost more than leaded since lead was added to unleaded gas so it stands to reason prices should have been reversed.
Living in small town.
I griped about grocery prices, too.
But I also remember the first time I had to pay a whole quarter to a vending machine to get a soft drink, about 1969, and complained then!
Would love to be able to pay those prices with current income but it ain't going to happen!!
Actually, some of the prices are much more reasonable than others, but the numbers have gone up a lot. Do you remember how much a computer cost back in the late 1980's? Gold on the other hand costs a great deal more. Back in the mid 1970's you could buy a roasted 1/2 chicken for $0.99, and now that won't even get two wings at Wing Stop!
I didn't grow up in the WWII era, but some time after that, and watched a lot of the old TV cartoon and comedy shows.
Do you remember the old Red Skeleton show with the hobo character? Does anyone in the Gen X, Gen Y, and millenial generation even know what a hobo is/was?
One of the animated cartoons featured a flea, and the flea discovered a dog. The flea gathered up a knife and fork to go over to the dog, singing a song including the line "There'll be no more meatless Tuesdays for me...". I have to admit, I had to ask my parents about that, but it supported the War effort for WWII, by not eating meat on Tuesdays. There were also Ration Books for goods like gasoline and sugar, plus other basic staples. And I thought the gas lines were bad, but it never really got worse than an annoyance for me. When you ran out of the ration coupons, you could not get that item until you got your next ration book, with more coupons. (You could swap with friends and neighbors, if you had some that they needed or wanted.)
Another phrase that was used in a lot of "cop shows" was 'drop a dime', which referred to spending a dime on a pay phone to give the Police an anonymous tip.
1) pay phones have cost more than $0.10 for a long time, 2) pay phones are hard to find, 3) because so many people have at least one cell phone on them. In fact, kids as young as 10 have a cell phone...
And about leaded gasoline... it is all about marketing.
The change also required the engine makers to make changes, because the lead additive helped keep engines running! The lead helped the valves inside an engine seal better, and for longer, and the piston rings as well. Now, the engines are machined much better, and they are made with better materials. But, the "unleaded gas" was a new thing, so it **should** be worth more, right?.
These days, some of the gasoline pumps still say "Enriched with up to 10% Ethanol".
There is that marketing thing again...
In fact, a truer statement would be "Diluted with up to 10% Ethanol", because ethanol does not have as much energy by volume and weight when compared to gasoline. The alcohol also will even pull moisture out of the air to mix with it, and that water has no energy content as fuel. Ethanol does lower 'gas' mileage. In fact, most of the newer pumps have signage that reads "Contains up to 10% Ethanol."
(As required by Federal Law. Thank you, EPA. But eliminating lead emissions was a good thing, Ethanol is/was a lesser thing and highly political rather than practical. IMHO)
Prices WERE actually quite a bit lower. Just look at the gasoline prices in movies and TV shows about 3-4 years old, compared to today's lower prices. Then go back to the old Black-and-White shows and movies to see really low gas prices.
I also had a white collar job that paid about $5/hour in the mid 1970's, and a raise of $0.05 per hour actually allowed buying nicer/more things. That was 1% for a raise, when there was negligible inflation.
These days, you actually need 2-3% just to keep up with inflation. (Remember ALICE IN WONDERLAND when the characters had to keep running faster and faster just to keep from falling behind?)