Butch Asks, ‘A Butterfinger Costs How Much?’

  I was heading home from a ballgame recently and stopped at a gas station to buy my weekly lottery ticket. While the attendant ran my “not-so-lucky” numbers through the machine, I spotted a Butterfinger candy bar at the checkout counter. Yum . . . haven’t had one of those in years . . . so I placed it on the counter with my printed ticket.

“That will be $4.88” . . . “Wait, I only wanted one lottery ticket.” . . . “There it is . . . the candy bar is $2.88.” I stood there in disbelief. Wasn’t it just yesterday that it was a nickel? OK . . . well maybe that was 60 years ago, but still . . . how can that be? Same deal when I buy a one-dip ice cream cone. Those nickel cones are over $3. That cream must have come from some high-class cows.

  When you think about it, there are many items that have ridiculous prices nowadays. I realize inflation has caused an increase, but the prices that are charged on certain things seems like out-and-out robbery. One example is bottled water. It’s no better than tap water, but tell that to the people who buy it. The same goes with a cup of coffee at Starbucks or similar establishments. I tried one a few years ago. No difference in taste between it and my Folgers Keurig cup coffee.

   My wife bought a birthday card at Walmart last week . . . $6! That card could not have cost more than a dime to print it. And speaking of printing, I purchase books for the library every two weeks at Barnes and Noble. A hardback book by a popular author is priced at $30 or more. The library receives a 20 percent discount, which lowers our cost to $24, but that is still too high. Even popular paperback books are $18 to $20. That is one reason so many people use the library today, where you can check out books for free.

  Groceries are also sky high . . . The grocery bill for my wife and I run right around $250 a week, and we very seldom buy any meat. Fast food and restaurant meals are no bargains either. Those 15 cent McDonalds hamburgers are LONG gone, and when we eat at a sit-down establishment, my wife and I normally buy one meal, ask for an extra plate, and split it.

  Have you attended a concert or professional sports event lately? If you haven’t, be prepared to mortgage your house for a ticket. The Colts just gave quarterback Daniel Jones an $88 million contract for two years. But that is small pay compared to basketball player Stephen Curry’s $156 million, baseball star Shohei Ohtani who signed a 10-year deal for $700 million, and soccer star Cristiano Ronaldo, who makes $260 million a year. And we wonder why sports tickets cost so much! Mickey Mantle’s salary of $100,000 looks like peanuts today, which is probably what the barkers now make selling peanuts at the games. 

   A lady came in the library last week to tell me she was moving. She was tired of paying $900 monthly rent here in town. She lives in a former business on Main Street, which was converted to an apartment . . . definitely no high-class suite. She told me she is looking to buy a house. Well, good luck with that, as the price of a decent house is beyond the dream of the average single person wage earner. She may be living in a tent next year.

   The worst prices, in my opinion, are in the field of healthcare. The cost of hospital care, physician services, prescriptions, emergency room visits, ambulance transports, etc. is out of this world. Placement in a nursing home will devour a person’s life savings in a matter of months. The answer? Don’t get sick or injured. Otherwise, you’re out of luck, buster.

   There is one item in which I am glad the price has increased. A pack of cigarettes is now almost $10. When I quit smoking 26 years ago, the price was $2 a pack. As a police officer also working an extra full-time job back in those days, I was smoking two packs a day. Those two packs today would cost me $140 a week . . . over $7,000 a year. Cigarette smoking today, thank goodness, has decreased as a result. Of course, now more people smoke weed. You can get cancer and brain fog at the same time . . . pay more for those munchies . . . and perhaps visit your buddies in jail.

   Well, what can we do about all of this? Not much it seems. We can stop purchasing items we don’t need. We can find cheaper substitutes for some items. And we can complain. Or we can keep buying everything we want whether we need it or not. Hey, that’s the American way! I am planning on winning the lottery. I will win when I’m 99 years old. My kids will get all of the money . . .

John “Butch” Dale is a retired teacher and County Sheriff. He has also been the librarian at Darlington the past 37 years, and is a well-known artist and author of local history.