Grocery Prices Up Steeply From Same Time Last Year… Lumber is now Luxury… Treasury Sec Yellen backtracks after telling truth about economy

MINNEAPOLIS (WCCO) — Your grocery list could be eating away at your budget, without you noticing.

Nearly everything at the store, from beef and cereal, to fruit and veggies, costs more than it did a year ago.

Shannon Bjork, an expecting mother from Spring Lake Park, says the grocery bill in her house has raised a few eyebrows.

“At the end of the total is when you’re like, ‘Holy cow, $200 for all this,’” Bjork said.

minnesota.cbslocal.com/2021/05/04/grocery-prices-up-steeply-from-same-time-last-year/

 

Lumber prices soared above $1600 for the first time in history this week.
The rise comes amid falling supply and increased demand for new homes and renovations.
Lumber-related stocks are soaring in response and the average price of a new single-family home has jumped by $35,872.

markets.businessinsider.com/news/stocks/lumber-prices-top-1600-first-time-amid-homebuilding-boom-2021-5-1030392438

Treasury Sec Yellen Backtracks After Telling Truth About Economy

On one hand, Janet Yellen is a highly trained economist who understands the Joe Biden spending bonanza could be a recipe for economic disaster.

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But as Treasury Secretary, she is also the captain of the Biden economic team, downplaying inflationary fears and cheerleading the big-budget bills. The schizophrenic nature of Yellen’s role inside the White House played out earlier this week with a rare public dissention from official administration economic talking points. Wittingly or not, the Treasury Secretary signaled to the American public that Biden’s spending blitz of $2 trillion here, and another $5 trillion there, has the potential to backfire and send the economy back into recession.

It began early Tuesday, when Yellen apparently forgot she was no longer President Obama’s Fed chair, with a shield of at least quasi independence. At a conference hosted by the Atlantic magazine she conceded something glaring obvious to someone who had just taken Econ 101, much less earning a PhD: “It may be that interest rates will have to rise somewhat to make sure that our economy doesn’t overheat . . .” That is, unlike what happened when Obama pushed through a huge stimulus package in the aftermath of the 2008 financial crisis, Biden wants to spend countless trillions at a time when the US economy is in full post-COVID recovery mode.

Too much money chasing too few goods means we could find ourselves in the same position as the late 1970s, with hyperinflation. As Yellen well knows, inflation is a massive tax increase on working people and it almost always leads to a recession as the Fed cranks up interest rates to slow down the economy.

The Fed, of course, could sit on its hands and do nothing, but bond market won’t. Traders will sell bonds because they’re a lousy inflation hedge. Spiking yields on the 10-year and 30-bonds (which move in opposite direction from prices) will spread to interest rates on credit cards, mortgages and business loans.

nypost.com/2021/05/05/janet-yellen-tells-truth-on-economy-then-quickly-reverses-herself/

When a house in Berkeley sold for more than $1 million over its list price in late March 2021, it was covered in media outlets across the Bay Area, including this one.

While the Berkeley sale was particularly sensational — it sold for double its list price and received 29 offers — these individual stories are becoming more common in today’s real estate market, according to recent data and anecdotes from real estate professionals.

www.sfgate.com/realestate/article/2021-05-east-bay-real-estate-overbids-hot-market-16151227.php

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