Julianne Malveaux: Let them eat flakes…Inflation, nutrition, and reality

(TriceEdneyWire.com) – Remember the parable of the blind men and the elephant? As each approached an elephant and tried to describe it, they came up with wildly disparate answers. One thought it a snake, another a tree, another a trunk. Because they were blind, they could not see the big picture; they described the part of the elephant they could touch. Inflation is something like that. People describe it based on the way it hits them, and it hits each family differently. Those with incomes below the median salary of $56,420 per year are hit hardest and most likely counting their pennies. Those with higher incomes shrug off some of the ways inflation hurts. But make no mistake, it hurts. Grocery prices are up by 25 percent in the past four years, so you are now spending $125 for food you paid $100 for four years ago. To be sure, inflation is waning. Groceries increased by 2.6 percent between January 2023 and January 2024, compared to 10 percent the year before. The Federal Reserve has been grappling with ways to lower inflation, but they need help fixing supply chain issues and corporate greed. Still, inflation reminds us how disparate our...