| trader4@optonline.net: Mar 23 07:08AM -0700 > > people's food in the 60's. I live at the shore, I know. > I don't know if you lived at the shore, nor do I know about your memory. But I do know that I have the internet. > To begin- the wholesale price of lobster is better than $8/lb (look it up). I don't think so: http://www.undercurrentnews.com/2014/07/24/new-englands-live-lobster-prices-set-to-fall-to-seasonal-lows-as-new-shell-product-hits-market/ Looks more like $5.50. I can buy them in the supermarket for $8, $6 when they are on sale. > In 1961 the wholesale price of lobster was $0.53/lb. That can be found on page 24 of this document: > http://digitalcommons.library.umaine.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1073&context=fisheries That puts the retail price at ~ $1.06, ie 2X wholesale > Inflation figured in, $0.53 in 1961 is equal to about $4 today. Don't have to adjust to today. The issue was whether poor people were eating lobster in 1960. Just look at the link I posted early in the thread that shows the actual prices of some other sources of food in 1960: http://www.clearpictureonline.com/1960-Food-College-Income.html Sirloin stake is $.79 a pound. Were poor people eating that? And note that a pound of sirloin is almost all edible. A pound of lobster, maybe half is edible, so double the cost delta. Even if you somehow got that lobster at wholesale, at your $.53, the effective cost of the meat is easily double that. What were poor people eating: fryers: .37 /lb grnd beef .33 rice .15 bread .14 potatoes .05 bananas .10 And those are *retail* prices. Using: > http://www.dollartimes.com/inflation/inflation.php?amount=300&year=1961 > Conclusion: Lobster was easily half the price in 1961 as it is today. And that is wholesale. Today there are many more middlemen and the people in N.E. are competing against a world market to put lobsters on the plates of starving children of Portland. Even if it was half the price it was today, that has nothing to do with whether poor people could afford it or not. Diamonds were probably half the price, did the poor have those too? The other fundemental misconception you have is that somehow poor people are able to buy lobster at wholesale prices. Wholesale, is, well wholesale, ie large quantities to the trade. I've lived near the shore my whole life and we never had some special track to buy at wholesale prices or anywhere near wholesale price for seafood or just about anything else. We paid retail, even at fish markets near the shore. Some exceptional rare circumstances excepted. And we were middle class and rarely had lobster because it was expensive compared to other food choices. The above proves it. |
| bleachbot <bleachbot@httrack.com>: Mar 23 09:03AM +0100 |
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