WORLD WORLDWIDE UK News Journal Update - (en) UK, AnarCom: Inflation and the 'cost of living' lie (ca, de, it, pt, tr)[machine translation]

 

We note with anger and derision the fanfare being made at a fall in the
rate of inflation as if it were pennies from heaven! ---- In whose straw
poll do hands shoot up to the question 'have you noticed your
pay/benefits/tax credits outstripping inflation?' ---- The way the
current pundits portray the reduction in the rate of inflation as a
beneficial experience in our daily lives is a complete fiction.  The
rate of increases in prices has slowed a little. Prices are not coming
down our lives are not becoming more affordable.

The causes of inflation are invariably political, the result of choices
of who pays for capitalist crisis. Those in power, those with the money
make those choices. The rest of us choose between heating, clothing,
accommodation and food.

All over the country, record numbers are queueing at food banks, warm
hubs and social supermarkets. These voluntary institutions themselves
being clear that they are increasingly unable to fulfill their remit,
with rising running costs and costs of goods, production, delivery etc.

The pound in our pocket buys a third less than a decade ago. Nearly 15%
less than two years ago.

Whatever measly increase in our wages they have given, still less in the
paltry level of benefits, may look like on paper now inflation is
claimed at 4.6%, it  is nothing but a charade of smoke and mirrors.

It hides the reality that our standard of living has declined and our
struggle to survive has grown harder since the great banking collapse of
2008.

And it's not just about numbers on paper, it's about the disappearance
of services of social value to meet the needs of working-class people
and our communities.

It's no good being able to afford your heating if you can't afford your
home!  You may be able to buy a cushion, but you can't afford the sofa;
if you can afford dental care, you can't find an NHS dentist, if you can
afford your medication, the treatment to remove your need for it is put
of further and further into the future for the absence of doctors and
medical care.

As for social care, disability aids, childcare, mental health services,
children's activities, holidays, well, most just can't have access for
love nor money.

And of course, it's the poor and marginalised to take the blame. Too
lazy to work, not really unfit.  Refugees gaming the system while our
government games Rwanda. Banks raking-in interest driven profits while
the homeless make selfish lifestyle choices.

Perhaps little highlights the lies behind the cost of living more than
the unacceptable cost of dying. It's no wonder our TV screens of full of
adverts for "we'll come and take your body away and deliver back your
ashes by van for a fraction of the cost".

It's hardly surprising that we can't afford to live with dignity when we
can't even afford to die with it!

Where has all the money that is supposedly unavailable, gone?  We know
it's there; we produced it through our work, our skills, through the
labours  of our minds and bodies.

It is there, not hiding, but in plain sight. The billions that aren't
personally Rishi's and his friends, we see blowing up Gaza and Ukraine
every day.  Making room for more profit-making expansion plans.  The
profit driven inflation claimed back from us through austerity.

The poverty of our daily lives is a reflection of the poverty of
morality and values of the capitalist class and its proxies. The only
good news about inflation is that it ends with the end of capitalism.

By Dreyfus

https://anarcomuk.uk/2023/11/16/inflation-and-the-cost-of-living-lie/
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