Reply to Why does it feel like people have unlimited budgets, even with crazy inflation?

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[quote=Anonymous]You might just not see it, OP.

We are not wealthy and did not get richer during the pandemic. In fact, I had a pretty bad year in my business last year because the rate increases tanked demand in my sector and my second half was trash.

We absolutely notice inflation and have changed a lot of our spending habits as a result. When a bunch of my work projects got stalled last year, I used the extra down time to really crack down on our food and clothing spending, and started aggressively shopping deals (like reviewing grocery store circulars and doing meal planning based on deals, clipping coupons, plus selling some older clothes online and using only the proceeds of those sales for new clothing purchases, or buying on consignment to save).

But because I went into low cash flow mode last year, when inflation started to come down this year AND my business picked way up in January, we are now spending more normally again on non-food and non-clothing items. I'm still watching our grocery/takeout/clothing budgets like a hawk, but we are taking a couple nice vacations and doing stuff like going to the movies and going to sporting events, things we didn't do at all last year because of belt-tightening.

Milk and eggs are back to more normal prices, as are most produce and even meats and cheeses. And now we're in the habit of not doing as much restaurant meals/take out or buying the pricier prepared foods at the store. So coupled with a return to my normal income, it feels like we have more disposable income. But it's kind of an illusion.[/quote]

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