News Story of the Day: A new report from the University of Guelph suggests that next year’s food price inflation in Canada will be the highest in the industrialized world. According to the study, the average Canadian household will spend $8,631 on groceries and restaurant meals in 2016, up by $345 due to food price inflation.
Researchers estimate that food price inflation could soar between two and four percent next year, which is on par with this year’s 4.1 percent. This could affect the average household’s pocket book by an additional $325.
Overall consumer prices in the 12 months since to October were up one percent due to dropping fuel prices. One of the reasons for Canada’s rising food prices is the rising value of the United States dollar and the collapsing loonie, which boosts the price of U.S. imports.
Here are six categories expected to go up in 2016:
Meats: 2.5 to 4.5 percent
Fish and Seafood: one to three percent
Fruits and nuts: 2.5 to 4.5 percent
Vegetables: two to four percent
Grains: 0.2 percent
Dairy and eggs: zero to two percent
Chart of the Day: From The Street:
“The green oval in the price chart highlights a cluster of indicators of a mature downtrend. This cluster implies at least a 50% rise in the price of gold futures in the coming 12 to 24 months. First, the lower two-standard-deviation band (golden/olive line) is being tested, which controls 95% of normality and hasn’t let prices close below it in 30 months. Second, the lower channel line of the channel that has controlled prices since July 2013 is also being tested (successfully, so far). It has supported price in the past six tests since the channel began. Third, although price is making a lower low vs. the price low of late 2014, stochastics are making a higher low. This condition is called a bullish divergence buy signal and represents the drying up of bearish energy as the final wiggles of price pattern wind themselves into completion.”
Illustration of the Day: Minimum wage advocates just don’t understand it, or they don’t want to. But perhaps the illustration below via AEI will help with their education.
Quote of the Day: With Seattle only just a couple of weeks away from raising the minimum wage even further, it seems lawmakers, particularly Kshama Sawant, need to check out a Milton Friedman quote:
“The minimum wage law is most properly described as a law saying that employers must discriminate against people who have low skills. That’s what the law says. The law says that here’s a man who has a skill that would justify a wage of $5 or $6 per hour (adjusted for today), but you may not employ him, it’s illegal, because if you employ him you must pay him $9 per hour. So what’s the result? To employ him at $9 per hour is to engage in charity. There’s nothing wrong with charity. But most employers are not in the position to engage in that kind of charity. Thus, the consequences of minimum wage laws have been almost wholly bad. We have increased unemployment and increased poverty.”
Video of the Day: It isn’t just liberals and libertarians dislike Donald Trump. As the video embedded below, one particular bald eagle detests the GOP frontrunner. Will he start banning the bald eagle like he wants to do with Muslims and the Internet?
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