{"id":74855,"date":"2022-09-24T02:15:40","date_gmt":"2022-09-24T09:15:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lenpenzo.com\/blog\/?p=74855"},"modified":"2024-01-27T11:24:45","modified_gmt":"2024-01-27T19:24:45","slug":"black-coffee-24-sept-2022","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lenpenzo.com\/blog\/id74855-black-coffee-24-sept-2022.html","title":{"rendered":"Black Coffee: Truth or Consequences"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"It’s time to sit back, relax and enjoy a little joe …<\/em><\/p>\n

Welcome to another rousing edition of Black Coffee, your off-beat weekly round-up of what’s been going on in the world of money and personal finance.<\/p>\n

I hope everybody had a wonderful week. And with that, let’s get right to this week’s commentary, shall we?<\/p>\n

There are only three ways to meet the unpaid bills of a nation. The first is taxation. The second is repudiation. The third is inflation.<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

– Herbert Hoover<\/strong><\/p>\n

The truth is an objective standard by which reality is measured.<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

– Tony Evans<\/strong><\/p>\n

Sooner or later, everyone sits down to a banquet of consequences.<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

– Robert Louis Stevenson<\/strong><\/p>\n

Credits and Debits<\/strong><\/p>\n

Debit:<\/strong><\/span> Did you see this? Tesla is significantly increasing prices at its Supercharger<\/a> stations across Europe as the continent continues to deal with a sprawling energy crisis that shows no signs of slowing. How big are the increases? Well \u2026 it used to cost no more than $5 for a full charge at a Supercharger; now, prices are near $30, which means the cost to charge those “green” EVs is fast approaching the cost to fill up an internal combustion engine car with gasoline. One can only imagine how much more expensive electricity will be if EVs ever become a majority of the cars on the road, rather than just a few percent. In the meantime …<\/p>\n

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(h\/t: BobbyJenkins via Memedroid.com)<\/p><\/div>\n

Debit:<\/strong><\/span> On a related note, this week a German bakery was slapped with a $330,000 gas bill<\/a> from its energy provider – that’s an average of $82,500 for the four-month billing period. Compare that to last year, when the bakery’s large furnaces and heating system expenses averaged $5856 per month. “Are they crazy?<\/strong><\/em>” said owner Eckehard Vatter, who was given just two weeks to pay the bill. The owner also complained that he wasn’t given a reason for the price increase. Hmm. Maybe he should ask the European bureaucrats who are dictating German energy policy.<\/p>\n

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(h\/t: r\/wallstreetsilver u\/jonandheidi)<\/p><\/div>\n

Debit:<\/strong><\/span> Meanwhile, on this side of the pond, more than half (56%) of all US households say inflation has caused financial hardships<\/a>. In fact, the number of households reporting financial troubles caused by price increases has gone up 11% since November 2021. Then again, that’s really not surprising, considering that Americans will have to come up with an extra $11,500<\/a> this year if they want to enjoy the same standard of living they had in 2020.<\/p>\n

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(h\/t: mediacloud.theweek.com)<\/p><\/div>\n

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Credit:<\/strong><\/span> Of course, the impact on American households depends on their place on the economic ladder. For example, half of all US income is earned by households making more than $100,000 per year. And as Morgan Stanley analyst Andrew Sheets points out, “since most of those households own their own homes, and either have no mortgage or have refinanced into a 30-year fixed-rate mortgage at an extremely low rate, their largest expense isn’t rising<\/a> because, even as the Fed is hiking, their nominal wages are rising. So for them financial conditions are easing<\/strong><\/em>.” And if you find that<\/strong><\/em> to be surprising, then you haven’t seen this …<\/p>\n