Inflation Hits Hawaii Hard

Imagine going to your local grocery store and paying over $8 for a jar of Jif peanut butter. How about $5.50 for a loaf of white bread, $6.50 for a gallon of milk or $7.19 for a half-gallon of orange juice?

These are just some of the prices we found in a recent survey of Hawaii's supermarkets. Families there are certainly paying the price for living in paradise.

Read the whole story here.

Comments

[jonthebru]

Its not as bad here as the article states. Hawaii is expensive, get used to it. Our main problem is importing food from the Mainland. The shippers can add "fuel surcharges" anytime they need to.
And no the Japanese do not control everything and the native Hawaiians are on the rise, thank you very much.
I for one am grateful my personal worth is not connected to a large fuel consuming pickup or SUV that costs 130.00 to fill with fuel.

[thegreatgiginthesky]

Give it time. In a few years they are going to be paying people to go live there.

[KillTheMessenger]

I am going to be the first one to volunteer.

[BobSF94117]

For years I've read about the end of pineapple and sugar cane agriculture in the Hawaiian Islands due to cheaper production costs in the Philippines and other places. So what happened to all the agricultural land???

[KillTheMessenger]

It was still there when I went there the last time a couple of years ago. The complaints probably came from rich plantation owners who wanted subsidies or trade protections.

[falco]

Hawaiians are having a hard time. Just as in certain areas of the rest of the country (San Diego, etc) people's children are not able to buy a house because of inflated prices. These poor people are destined to live at poverty levels or leave their beautiful island in order to afford a house. The cost of flying to Hawaii is double what it was last year. Less tourism will hurt - bad. How about it airlines? How about somewhere in your mergers and monopoly you consider making it affordable to vacation in Hawaii to help these natives keep thier head above water. We are turning into the have's and have nots, nothing in between. And we know what happens then - the natives get restless...

[emerywood]

The " excuses " or explanation for the higher prices of everything there is supposedly " everything has to be shipped over there". Their State taxes are also higher than in other States. But then, their salaries are also slightly higher. To live in Paradise ? You take your pick.

[AtomiClash]

Many, many Hawaiians do not choose to live in paradise, they were born there. Native Pacific Islanders there are the ones who almost always get the short end of the economic stick. The millionaires that relocate there can handle the $8 peanut butter, but people who are already so poverty-stricken that they live in tent communities cannot. Every region is economically diverse, even "paradise."

[TXfemmom]

I saw the craziness of food prices in Hawaii, when my son was stationed there on a sub. He was away so much, so when an emergency arose with his wife, child, and then children, I was the one who went. When my daughter-in-law was sick, in bed, I had to go to their grocery stores and was I sticker shocked. I tried to buy things which were on sale and work it in, cut back on the sizes of meat servings, and bought store brands, but paid well over twice as much for the same thing that she could purchase at the PX. Of course, she had to be able to shop for us to go there.

I stocked up on more purchases of staples, when she could go, and froze the meat, but fresh milk, bread, and vegetables had to be purchased at the local stores when she was on bed rest.

Hawaii is wonderful and the only place I know where one can drive from lush, tropical surroundings, to dessert in thirty minutes.

[Troubledwawa]

This is sad.

What's even more sad is there isn't a physical shortage of food or fuel, just greedy speculators.

There is a difference between investing and speculating.

And if there ever was a reason to repeal W's tax cuts to the speculators, this is it.

[KillTheMessenger]

Hawaii was very expensive before the prices for oil went up so much. No need to blame everything and its grandmother on this "pesky speculators" (which, by the way, are you and me and our pension funds).

Maybe ocean front real estate will come down a bit? I am considering buying a little piece of paradise...

[tililek]

Inflation is bothering me also - I expect most Americans are feeling it as well, at least in Hawaii they don't have to worry about winters. And how far do they drive when they drive?

Don't feel any sorrier for them than anyone else, unless its those people who are being flooded out of home and all costs related to that.

[MajorKong]

Yikes! I knew Hawaii was expensive but I had no idea it had gotten this bad.

[lungfish]

I live in Hawaii and the food and gas prices (I just paid $4.48/gal for gas) are simply untenable. I don't live a luxurious lifestyle. I live simply on vegetables, bits of fish or chicken, occasional pasta and sauce.... lots of fruit off the trees - its mango season and I can grab a couple for breakfast on the way to work. However, i am a single man, living alone with no dependents. I can't imagine what real families with real issues are dealing with. Never mind those that overspent and bought trucks and SUVs, etc....
Thanks to our GOP and Dem failures, losers, I am sure that it will only get worse. We were just sold out on the FISA telecom immunity bill and the rest so I am now officially withdrawing my membership to the Democratic party. I don't think Obama will make one bit of difference though he is a great choice... The Congress is failing all of us. Justice is off the table... and I am finally convinced that American has compromised its integrity beyond the point of no return, thanks to our Democratic "leaders" who are all just a bunch of failures who are so beholden to corporations and to covering their asses for re-election that we can no longer hope for acceptable quality of life or accountability for our worst criminals..

[robinhood2]

Don't complain about $4.48 gas. In the Bay area, you could easily pay over $4.50, and there are 4 oil refineries in the area. The highest price I saw for regular on 6/19 was $4.67 in Menlo Park.

[KillTheMessenger]

Gas in Europe is well over $8/gallon. And people are heating with oil... so there is no need to get all worked up over some of the lowest gas prices in the developed world.

[jsarets]

You can still buy most whole grains and dry beans for about $1/lb in bulk, and a pound of these foods goes a long way. High energy costs will push people toward minimally-processed plant staples. Meat will gradually become a luxury item even in America because it's 5-10 times as energy-intensive as plant-based protein.

I'm not a vegetarian by any means (not sure I could live without ribs and wings), but I'm studying vegetarian cuisines from around the world so that I will be ready to cut back on meat by up to 75% as energy and food becomes more expensive. The age of the ubiquitous cheeseburger may be coming to a close.

[KillTheMessenger]

Beans are great and they are good for you. There are endless things one can do with potatoes. I am not worried we will ever go hungry or have a poorer diet than we already have. We just need to learn to accept that what we do and eat now is a waste of our resources.

[themodernleader]

A debauched currency has consequences that we are only beginning to recognize. One consequence could be the unravelling of sections of our country as the citizentry become deranged and rebellous caused by inability to afford essentials of life.
As our leaders remain deadlocked in the struggle for power, our Country enters a danger zone of increasingly desperate and fearful citizens. And envious, greedy foreign others are looking on and patiently waiting to spring as our weakness and helplessness spreads.

[joebaggadonuts]

Unfortunately, most citizens have been dis-educated to the point that they/we depend on the systemic factory food chain which (as is becoming painfully apparent) is no longer sustainable. Your concern for what the masses will do when they are hungry and powerless is warranted.

But not to worry, our fearless leader has provided work camps for the restless hands. Blackwater will staff them and work will be done there. Work makes freedom, dontcha know.

As for Hawaii, I can't believe that people there will not resort to growing food and bartering. Shifting to grains from meat will help, but having chicken cages in the back yard and potatoes in the ground will help a lot too. Besides, there's plenty of good fishing left there, unlike the fished out contintental coasts. It's the city dwellers in towers without yards and the California condo owner types who have a 15 square foot yard that I worry about.

[KillTheMessenger]

Why are you worried about the city dwellers? We have plenty of food. We just need to stop burning it in our cars. Here is a little thing to think about: 1 gallon of gasoline contains 130MJ of energy. A human being needs 100W of power from food to sustain himself. This means that Joule by Joule and Calorie by Calorie, a gallon of gas can power a human being for 1.3million seconds. That's a full 15 days. Throw the inefficiency into the equation to make ethanol from corn and you can feed a human for a month or so on the equivalent of agriculture needed to produce 1 gallon's worth of gas in corn ethanol.

Eat for a month or drive twenty miles... That's a pretty easy choice, isn't it?

[unbozo]

Let theem eat poi?

[zizyphus]

I have lived in Hawaii for decades and am used to the high prices. I shop in the natural food stores, where the bulk food prices are better than the conventional stores. The tighter your money, the more important it is to choose whole, fresh foods.

[dadw5boys]

The Japanessee have found a way to get rid of the Native Hawaiians they control everything else on the island.