Inflation. Cartoon of 03/04/2022 in CTXT
In March prices rose by 9.8%, the biggest increase since 1985. This storm in the CPI, largely caused by the so-called "energy crisis", has pushed up the prices of almost everything, which had already been rising for months.
In El País I saw a headline in front page that read "Back to the nightmare of the 1970s"and added that "the rise in prices harks back to a time unknown to young people". And for older people, I add, because at the beginning of the 70s, the undersigned was a child and the memories, although not wonderful, do not seem like a nightmare to me now. It is true that those were not easy times for anyone.
Perhaps that is why, having grown up in the midst of shortages and economic hardship, from an early age I somatised the fact that I had to maintain a combat economy. A habit that has been with me ever since, right up to the present day.
La cesta de la compra, cartoon of 23/01/2022 in CTXT
As news now expires before the fish is even wrapped in it, that inflationary shock was a one-day flash in the pan, but inflation will continue to hit households; more than half of the income is already going on household expenses and the shopping basket.
"Pensioners and low-income groups subsisting on less than a thousand euros a month devote almost 50% and nearly 20% of their spending to pay for the groups of goods and services in which the rise in prices is concentrated". (2)
To all this must be added other collateral effects as a consequence of the war in Ukraine, the increase in the cost of transport in a globalised production chain and the increase in the cost of the energy needed to process these foods, as well as the restrictions on trade in fertilisers from Russia and China, two of the world's main producers, and a strong speculative component in the futures markets. (3)
