Look around at any Jewish neighborhood and you’ll find families struggling. Not one or two, but dozens. I’m talking about families not being able to cough up the money to keep their homes heated. And some can’t even buy food.
The food part is what troubles me most. It’s not a secret that inflation has taken a chunk out of everyone’s bank accounts. Everything we need to buy is more expensive; from cheaper items to large expenses, costs have soared for everyone. But this problem appears to be much more acute in the frum community.
Take a look at food prices. The prices of eggs, chicken, meat, dairy – literally everything – has shot up way beyond the amount that prices have gone up in non-kosher supermarkets. Yes, everyone is paying higher prices, but why are we paying 20% more than the already inflation-affected prices in Walmart, ShopRite, and Costco?
What really needs to be asked, and I don’t intend to create a firestorm, is: are kosher food manufacturers using inflation as an excuse to jack up prices well beyond what they need to stay profitable? Have they found a way to enrich themselves off the backs of hardworking, struggling fellow Jews?
I could be wrong. Perhaps they have no option, for whatever reason, but to raise their prices beyond what non-kosher stores are hiking them to. I can’t say for sure. But if that is true, I’d like to know why and I want to know how it can be fixed. There are too many families unable to put food on the table for this crisis to be ignored. There are too many families relying on Tomchei Shabbos for us not to demand answers.
Chaim F. – Lakewood, NJ
1) Minimum wage laws has increased the costs of running businesses
ReplyDelete2) High gasoline prices has increased costs of running businesses
3) Theft of goods under $1,000 is not being prosecuted, making it harder to run a business
4) Chickens have long been underpaid and overworked and they have unionized.
5) No! Prices have also increased in the Walmart's, Aldi's, Target's, Shop Rite's and all other Non Jewish stores as inflation has been very high.
Yes you can shop in the Non Jewish stores and save some money.
Chaim F is from the lucky ones as 20% above Shoprite is a chessed among the heimishe 'grawceries'. Many of them are bilking us for as much as double to triple what Shoprite charges - for the same items!
ReplyDeleteIt is for sure outright stealing in the form of price gouging which is also against halacha & sometimes civil law too. Something has to be done about the Greedy Fressers profiteering off the backs of struggling Yidden like this!
Prices in Jewish stores have always been higher then in Supermarkets.
ReplyDeletePrices in NON Jewish stores - NON SUPERMARKETS - always were higher the the Jewish Stores.
Inflation pushed up prices in all of the world at the same rate.
Thus:
Jewish Stores are still higher then Supermarkets BY THE SAME PERCENTAGE.
Non Jewish Stores are still higher the Jewish Stores BY THE SAME PERCENTAGE.
Nothing changed except the inflation percentage.
Bottom line:
If you looking for Hellmans Mayo or Heinz Ketchup it cheaper in the Supermarkets. If your looking for heimish Mayo or Ketchup you'll pay more
in the Jewish Stores - as it always was from BEFORE inflation.
If your looking for heimish products in Supermarkets you'll pay MORE then in the Jewish Stores.
Most important:
if you need some extra funds to keep food on your table and heat in your home there are many options to see that you'll havw what you need. But don't blame the Jewish Store owners for somethng that out of their control.
If you think you can make it cheaper the YOU open a jewish Store and lead the the way...
Heimish, nice try but the goyishe gesheften have the same expenses from minimum wage & gasoline. Your chicken joke is not funny.
ReplyDeleteHeimishe supermarkets do not have a theft problem anywhere near what goyishe chains are experiencing. Flash mobs, homeless bums & serial shoplifters hardly target unzerra gesheften that are out of the way and because the heimishe crews manning the markets gang up to pounce on & hold shoplifting shkutzim for police.
Aldi & Lidl have by the way frozen pre-pandemic prices in place for the most part.
Anon 7:32 pm,
ReplyDeleteYour propaganda is NOT true!
Which heimishe market do you own?
The heimishe have gone WAY UP out of proportion since covid. For the same Eggland's Best egg carton why are some heimishe markets priced $8 when Wegmann's is $5? Many more examples.
The worst offender I've seen so far that's way ahead of the greedy heimishe pack is Evergreen
ReplyDeleteFoodstamps?that's the reason frimmeh supermarkets can charge what they want
ReplyDeleteGee, thanks a lot Evergreen guy - not! You put that jingle back in my head from when Evergreen farmed out a music CD with the theme song in Yiddish about the supermarket yeder einer loift a heen, blah blah.
ReplyDeleteWhat's with that corny line in the song of "heimish fish a gantzeh nacht"?
Some non-Jewish stores aren't making money. Stop and Shop in Brooklyn is closing down.
ReplyDeletePaul McCartney commented over 40 years on his record . Give a listen To “Juniors Farm” second stanza
ReplyDeleteLol, let's start with sky tuition that's anywhere between $600-$900 per kids, that even before food! Sadly earning today $250k on books as a frum jew takes you straight to the poor house, listen on don't blame these otd kids, I'm a grown man of 38yrs old and I'm considering leaving all of this unsustainable life and live like a cheap goy, ar least I'll have a financial future and i can still love hashem and learn, frum life became a rat race and a complete shit show
ReplyDelete