Are you giving yourself a 5.4% “raise” for 2022?

[jim555]

Damn-it, that oil change just went up another 20%.    That's a 50% increase over the last year.   It's bad news everyday.

I bought a pump that takes old oil from the top of the engine saving me the hassle of crawling under the car.  DIY saves a ton.  My point is a lot of costs can be worked around if you have a frugal mindset.

[boarder42]

@GuitarStv he pointed out his personal "inflation" situation based on natural gas prices rising very quickly for one year.  You didn't have to do a sanity check on a one-year situation that you misunderstood, nor did you have to post at all.  None of this was aimed at *you*, personally.  And I don't consider it whining, or getting upset.

We have a gas furnace that provides our heat and also heats our water - I expect our personal inflation rate to also be higher than 5% for the same goods as we bought this year, because of that utility cost increasing so much for us.   This is a fact worth stating.

i wouldnt say its a fact yet. its speculation currently as my NG prices havent changed yet.

I had heard few weeks ago that there would be similar increases in other types of heating fuels like heating oil and LP gas.  I mentioned this to my sister, and she said already filled their LP tank, and it was 35% higher than last year!  I thought maybe the higher prices wouldn't kick in right way.

https://www.cnbc.com/2021/11/30/us-natural-gas-sinks-on-track-for-worst-month-in-three-years.html

so the speculation is currently incredibly wrong who would have guessed that predicting the future could be so hard

[American GenX]

@GuitarStv he pointed out his personal "inflation" situation based on natural gas prices rising very quickly for one year.  You didn't have to do a sanity check on a one-year situation that you misunderstood, nor did you have to post at all.  None of this was aimed at *you*, personally.  And I don't consider it whining, or getting upset.

We have a gas furnace that provides our heat and also heats our water - I expect our personal inflation rate to also be higher than 5% for the same goods as we bought this year, because of that utility cost increasing so much for us.   This is a fact worth stating.

i wouldnt say its a fact yet. its speculation currently as my NG prices havent changed yet.

I had heard few weeks ago that there would be similar increases in other types of heating fuels like heating oil and LP gas.  I mentioned this to my sister, and she said already filled their LP tank, and it was 35% higher than last year!  I thought maybe the higher prices wouldn't kick in right way.

https://www.cnbc.com/2021/11/30/us-natural-gas-sinks-on-track-for-worst-month-in-three-years.html

so the speculation is currently incredibly wrong who would have guessed that predicting the future could be so hard

I got my first natural gas bill a few days ago.  It was up almost 90% compared to the same month last year, but my usage was up, so I'm not sure how much it would have been up if my usage was the same.  It's definitely quite a bit higher.  I'll see how it goes in another month.

[American GenX]

Damn-it, that oil change just went up another 20%.    That's a 50% increase over the last year.   It's bad news everyday.

I bought a pump that takes old oil from the top of the engine saving me the hassle of crawling under the car.  DIY saves a ton.  My point is a lot of costs can be worked around if you have a frugal mindset.

I used to change my oil all the time when I was younger.  Maybe I'll go back to that when I retire.  It doesn't look like you will save much after buying the oil and filter, though.

[PDXTabs]

Damn-it, that oil change just went up another 20%.    That's a 50% increase over the last year.   It's bad news everyday.

I bought a pump that takes old oil from the top of the engine saving me the hassle of crawling under the car.  DIY saves a ton.  My point is a lot of costs can be worked around if you have a frugal mindset.

I used to change my oil all the time when I was younger.  Maybe I'll go back to that when I retire.  It doesn't look like you will save much after buying the oil and filter, though.

That depends on what oil you are paying for. This is the most recent oil change I performed on a Toyota Yaris:

What	$ amount
OEM crush washer	$0.90
OEM filter	$4.50
3.9qt Mobil 1 full synthetic	$21.43

Total: $26.83 for a full synthetic oil change with an OEM filter and crush washer. The quick lube places will never replace the crush washer and it will eventually leak.

[JLee]

@GuitarStv he pointed out his personal "inflation" situation based on natural gas prices rising very quickly for one year.  You didn't have to do a sanity check on a one-year situation that you misunderstood, nor did you have to post at all.  None of this was aimed at *you*, personally.  And I don't consider it whining, or getting upset.

We have a gas furnace that provides our heat and also heats our water - I expect our personal inflation rate to also be higher than 5% for the same goods as we bought this year, because of that utility cost increasing so much for us.   This is a fact worth stating.

i wouldnt say its a fact yet. its speculation currently as my NG prices havent changed yet.

I had heard few weeks ago that there would be similar increases in other types of heating fuels like heating oil and LP gas.  I mentioned this to my sister, and she said already filled their LP tank, and it was 35% higher than last year!  I thought maybe the higher prices wouldn't kick in right way.

https://www.cnbc.com/2021/11/30/us-natural-gas-sinks-on-track-for-worst-month-in-three-years.html

so the speculation is currently incredibly wrong who would have guessed that predicting the future could be so hard

ehhhh..from the article:

For the year, natural gas is still up roughly 80%. It’s also on track for its best year since 2005./quote]

[FIPurpose]

@GuitarStv he pointed out his personal "inflation" situation based on natural gas prices rising very quickly for one year.  You didn't have to do a sanity check on a one-year situation that you misunderstood, nor did you have to post at all.  None of this was aimed at *you*, personally.  And I don't consider it whining, or getting upset.

We have a gas furnace that provides our heat and also heats our water - I expect our personal inflation rate to also be higher than 5% for the same goods as we bought this year, because of that utility cost increasing so much for us.   This is a fact worth stating.

i wouldnt say its a fact yet. its speculation currently as my NG prices havent changed yet.

I had heard few weeks ago that there would be similar increases in other types of heating fuels like heating oil and LP gas.  I mentioned this to my sister, and she said already filled their LP tank, and it was 35% higher than last year!  I thought maybe the higher prices wouldn't kick in right way.

https://www.cnbc.com/2021/11/30/us-natural-gas-sinks-on-track-for-worst-month-in-three-years.html

so the speculation is currently incredibly wrong who would have guessed that predicting the future could be so hard

ehhhh..from the article:

For the year, natural gas is still up roughly 80%. It’s also on track for its best year since 2005./quote]

That's only because the beginning of the year was an all-time low. Nat gas prices are not outrageously high. You can look back at the Bush era when Nat Gas was averaging 2x the price of what it is now. Saying it's up 80% on the year is just selective data mining to make it sound like Nat Gas prices are super high. No, at the beginning of the year, Nat Gas prices were abnormally low. In fact, the lowest they've ever been. (Remember when oil prices went negative due to covid?)

[JLee]

@GuitarStv he pointed out his personal "inflation" situation based on natural gas prices rising very quickly for one year.  You didn't have to do a sanity check on a one-year situation that you misunderstood, nor did you have to post at all.  None of this was aimed at *you*, personally.  And I don't consider it whining, or getting upset.

We have a gas furnace that provides our heat and also heats our water - I expect our personal inflation rate to also be higher than 5% for the same goods as we bought this year, because of that utility cost increasing so much for us.   This is a fact worth stating.

i wouldnt say its a fact yet. its speculation currently as my NG prices havent changed yet.

I had heard few weeks ago that there would be similar increases in other types of heating fuels like heating oil and LP gas.  I mentioned this to my sister, and she said already filled their LP tank, and it was 35% higher than last year!  I thought maybe the higher prices wouldn't kick in right way.

https://www.cnbc.com/2021/11/30/us-natural-gas-sinks-on-track-for-worst-month-in-three-years.html

so the speculation is currently incredibly wrong who would have guessed that predicting the future could be so hard

ehhhh..from the article:

For the year, natural gas is still up roughly 80%. It’s also on track for its best year since 2005./quote]

That's only because the beginning of the year was an all-time low. Nat gas prices are not outrageously high. You can look back at the Bush era when Nat Gas was averaging 2x the price of what it is now. Saying it's up 80% on the year is just selective data mining to make it sound like Nat Gas prices are super high. No, at the beginning of the year, Nat Gas prices were abnormally low. In fact, the lowest they've ever been. (Remember when oil prices went negative due to covid?)

Just like how saying natural gas had its worst month in three years is selective. ;)

[talltexan]

It will get worse before it gets better.

The tricks used in CPI calculation to keep the number artificially low can only work for so long. 

Example, if beef goes up 40% they will assume that people will do some substitution and swap beef for pork. Next month after pork as also rocketed, they swap pork for lamb, etc. The substitution effect reflects peoples' behaviour... however, in an inflationary environment there is eventually nothing left to substitute to as everything eventually goes up.  The higher level of inflation, the more substituting they will use in their calculations of CPI and the more the CPI numbers will lag the true rate of inflation.

If beef goes up in price that much, substituting in other meat is exactly what I do.

[American GenX]

It will get worse before it gets better.

The tricks used in CPI calculation to keep the number artificially low can only work for so long. 

Example, if beef goes up 40% they will assume that people will do some substitution and swap beef for pork. Next month after pork as also rocketed, they swap pork for lamb, etc. The substitution effect reflects peoples' behaviour... however, in an inflationary environment there is eventually nothing left to substitute to as everything eventually goes up.  The higher level of inflation, the more substituting they will use in their calculations of CPI and the more the CPI numbers will lag the true rate of inflation.

If beef goes up in price that much, substituting in other meat is exactly what I do.

But once you make the switch to chicken, and inflation is 10% again the next year, you shouldn't be able to say you're switching to chicken again to reduce the inflation figure, because you had already switched to chicken.

In fact, while I still eat low cost beef part of the time, usually due to a better than average sale price, I haven't bought any of the more expensive cuts in recent years, and it's just getting worse with the skyrocketing inflation we are seeing now.

[talltexan]

It sounds as though you're predicting equal inflation from today through 12/6/2022 as we have had since 12/6/2020.

[Roland of Gilead]

It sounds as though you're predicting equal inflation from today through 12/6/2022 as we have had since 12/6/2020.

Not unreasonable really.

[talltexan]

I think inflation will be lower, I would personally take the "under."

[Roland of Gilead]

I was actually noticing the other day that the lower quality cuts of meat had increased in price quite a bit more than the expensive cuts.

Stew meat was $7 a pound, used to be $3 a pound, over a 100% increase

Thick Angus ribeye was $13 a pound where it used to be $11 a pound, a 20% increase

Fillet was $20 a pound and I don't think it was much cheaper than that before but never bought it so don't remember.

Pork is still really inexpensive.   Boneless pork chops are about $3.50 a pound.

[American GenX]

I replaced an igniter in my furnace last year.  I thought it might be good to order a spare since they were only about $20.  Now they're over $30.   50% increase!

It seems like a lot of these infrequent purchases are going up even more than groceries. 

[dividendman]

My expenses aren't much higher. Yes we use substitution to cheaper things (chicken instead of beef, eating out less),or look more aggressively for sales.  If that means our "standard of living" is going down... so be it I guess, but I don't feel deprived of anything.

Anyway, I think long term inflation will be lower (lots of disinflationary pressures like technology, wealth concentration, population decline, etc. bonds also don't seem to be predicting a lot of inflation). I'm not doing anything differently if inflation is higher or lower anyway *shrug*.

[Wolfpack Mustachian]

I still am not seeing much increase in food prices in what we buy, which includes meat. Boneless skinless chicken breast is still $1.99/lb. Milk has probably gone up by 20 cents or so a gallon. I can, without fail, get raw fruits and vegetables (at least one of each type) at my goal price of $1/lb depending on what is on sale/in season.

[PDXTabs]

The percentage of household income spend on food in the USA has been goind down for decades and is now probably the lowest in the world.

[NorCal]

I budget on a line item basis.  Here's how I'll handle it in my budget:

-I'll probably budget an increase in food costs of 10% for 2022.  It's a complete SWAG, but seems reasonable based on what I've seen at the grocery store.
-I'll budget an increase in gas prices, but we don't drive a whole lot, so it probably won't be material.
-I'm assuming my car maintenance will be 20-30% higher, but this is mostly because the cars are getting older and giving us some surprises.
-I'll probably add an allowance for a more expensive vacation this summer.  We had planned to go on a very rare (for us) international trip for our 10th anniversary, but pandemic happened.

On the positive side:
-Our health insurance is actually slightly cheaper next year.  I'm not sure how this happened, but this will keep our overall inflation down since it's such a big part of the budget.
-Our youngest goes changes from "paid" pre-K to free Kindergarten in the fall.  That's a ~$900/mo savings.
-I've made some energy-efficiency improvements to the house this year, which pulled some one-time items into 2021, and will save us ~$400 in energy costs next year.

I haven't added it all up yet, but I think our "household" inflation/spend will be pretty negligible.  I guess the international trip could push the total up some, but I'm okay with that one.

[felixbf]

Only a tiny raise of $383.94 a month. My car will be done end of Feb 2022.
Also selling an older second car for $9000 to my brother. So a good start to the new year.
Plus saving on insurance, Licenses and petrol on that old car once it is gone.

[talltexan]

On the positive side:
-Our health insurance is actually slightly cheaper next year.  I'm not sure how this happened, but this will keep our overall inflation down since it's such a big part of the budget.

People deferred a lot of care to try to avoid being around COVID patients. I have a connection who works for an insurer, and their cash balances are all off the charts because the normal things they'd re-imburse for were just not happening.

[NorCal]

On the positive side:
-Our health insurance is actually slightly cheaper next year.  I'm not sure how this happened, but this will keep our overall inflation down since it's such a big part of the budget.

People deferred a lot of care to try to avoid being around COVID patients. I have a connection who works for an insurer, and their cash balances are all off the charts because the normal things they'd re-imburse for were just not happening.

I think our case is more state-specific.  Apparently, Colorado started a re-insurance program to manage some of the plan-risk of super expensive patients.  It sounds like this has made enough of a difference to keep the overall rates in check for this year.