Compared to the ruling class, the 1%s are practically destitute

For sure, I was just saying that the people who buy this stuff's money is tied up with the billionaires

Probably for eight bucks a packet.

When a Kraft Dinner box becomes a Kraft Snack, and a new Kraft Dinner Family box appears that's smaller than the original Kraft Dinner box and costs more.

The children yearn for the mines.

No, it's the parasite noticing suckling blood is getting harder, how bothersome!

They're far off from realizing the host dying.

Only way to beat them at their own game in this case is to not play.

That was the reason I stopped going to Carl's Jr years ago. Got to be about the same price as a real restaurant, albeit their burgers were still pretty big and not terrible. But when your best thing used to be advertised as being as good as a sir down burger but for only $6 and it goes up to the same price as a sit down burger, I might as well go get the sit down burger.

I had lunch at Booger King last year for the first time in a long time. The whopper and fries were actually surprisingly good, freshly cooked and tasty. But god damn did I feel like shit after eating it. I suppose it was all the salt. And it was $16, and that was without a drink even.

And for what? A cold ass burger that's super small and tastes different?

Pay the lowest possible wage and get the lowest possible effort.

Yeah I only hit them up for a large milk shake to blend with wild blueberries at home. Because I'm to lazy to make my own milkshake

I totally get that! When I visited the most was when they had the dollar menu and I honestly used it to survive back then. These days it's the app and only sometimes but same thing.

You couldn't beat $3.75 for 2 sandwiches and a small fry when I had $20 to my name that had to somehow last me the work week!

I wasn't able to start saving for retirement until my 30s, so I've joked for a while that my retirement plan is to die early. It's not so much of a joke anymore.

I was skimming and thought I jumped to a paid advertisement and missed the change.

Apparently not.

Eh the federal (in the us) min wage in 76 was $2 so by that logic yeah. But if we look at the average wage (less income disparity then, still there but not crazy yet) in 1970 being $8,510 then doing the math (assuming a 40 hour work week) that is more like $4 an hour so the average person would need to make $47 an hour in 2026.

And the average wage earned in the us of a in 2024 is...... $63,293. Doing the same math gets us $30.43 an hour. And that is with massive shifts in the gap between wages that are now prevalent.

Everyone focuses on the min wage part (as they think that is the easiest way to address this issue) but not the over all issues of labor not being valued at an amount that makes an economy work long term. The underlying issue is that companies see cutting costs as the best way to increase profits and payroll is the largest line item on almost every balance sheet. So upping the min wage helps but ultimately these places will still cut where they can (less staff, more work per staff, replacing staff with LLMs, etc.) and the issue will continue. In times past the min wage was there as a safety net, but most could expect more for their work, now min wage is more commonly what people expect to earn. Mix in under employment, unemployment that lasts long enough people don't count as unemployed anymore, and people having multiple part time jobs vs full time and you have a massive long term issue.

The question the companies that rely in any way on selling things to people should be asking is; "Who can buy their products?" not "we expect to sell more every quarter then last quarter at ever increasing prices, why are you all looking at us like that?"

This is the important part to anchor the statement.

Its meaningless to say $11.74 then and $100 now without some reference to what it takes to earn that same $11.74 and $100.

edit: unless you've just been hoarding all your wealth as cash since 1970, in which case you got fucked.

And tax the shit out of assets to decrease the relative value of investments to actually generating value through work. Rebalance the economic incentives away from maximizing margins towards maximizing volume.

What exactly is the boundary between the United States Government and the companies?

They're the same entity.

And as long as this government exists, those companies will exist and those companies will continue what they are doing.

Yes. Just like they did in 2008 to the big banks... oh wait.

These companies are the result of the consolidation you describe already, and unlike before they are failing before the crash. Think about Kraft for example, who are their big competitor? Who would Kraft merge with to create a bigger Kraft? Would anyone notice a difference? The chances of a bailout are also slim this time, outside of a few select small sycophants. We are not looking at the old cycle of bullshit, but the point where the ability of consumers to spend is crippled.

You are right that an economy will always "recover". The issue here is (as shown in the article above) across all industries and based in the result of a long long process of devaluing wage rates. So I do think there will be a recovery but I don't think that it will be bailouts and mergers this time. I think the "winners" here will be the cheaper providers and smaller companies as the world transitions into poorer times.

The one that paralleled Mussolini's "working class man" propaganda photo? Yup!

Fine industrial size woodchipper BUT we get to use the guillotine symbolically for the special guests

ONE guillotine? It would have to be running day and night to make a difference

Stop... i can only get so erect

More like "We've tried extinguishing a fire with gasoline and wondering why it didn't work" lol

Line must go up

You have a recommended source for it?

Same question for pasta - I've noticed just plain pasta seems to be like a lot - even the store brand - when I'm at stores, and that's for one little box. I'm assuming that can be bought in bulk and save a lot of $$$. If properly stored, that should have a long shelf life, too.

You can just buy cheese powder??

Never had those, but the fun shapes one was always my favorite since I was a kid and now even those taste like the plastic the regular ones tasted like for awhile.

I've really been liking Goodles. Reminds me of what Kraft used to taste like.

Not only did they raise prices they decreased the amount of product in the packages. One of their greedy stupid 'leaders' thought we would all just love that combination.

Funny you mention that, the last time I was driving late (I think about 1am) I needed to fill up on the way home and noticed people pulling up at the McDonalds across the parking lot even though the drive trough was on the other side of the building. I watched people get out, try the doors, shrug and then put their asses to the window and do their business. The funny part to me is that there is staff in side and these people had to know it, but did it anyway.

So in a way they do have facilities after 11pm.

For me, it's generally when I travel up to hotham (a 4hour trip). As I need fuel too and always tend to stop at the same servo.

But yeah, I remember my first big Mac probably 25 years ago. It was incredible. Now it's a limited edition

I’m not following. If Mcdy’s goes bankrupt, people still have to eat so they’ll go to grocery stores instead of restaurants. They won’t be paying a markup. Stores will expand because there will be more demand on the consumer side.