Price & Value

The price of everything has gone up over recent years;- Food inflation 5.1% - (e.g. beef, butter, milk, and chocolate) / Housing costs - mortgage interest and property maintenance, rental costs up 6.2% / Motor fuels / Services 4.7%. Inflation is caused by global demand & supply chain issues, high energy prices, & wage growth & labour costs. We all know what price means, it's literally the cost of living. The UK has had price inflation for all of the time that its price levels have been officially measured and reported. Between 2021-2023 inflation was historically high, reaching a 41-year peak. 

Inflation has significantly affected poverty in the UK by raising the costs of essential goods, particularly for low income households, who spend a larger proportion of their income on food & energy. This disproportionately impacted them, leading to a significant drop in their real incomes, increased material deprivation, and a rise in food insecurity. 

What is value though? The regard something deserves, it's importance, worth or usefulness? The estimate of the monetary worth of something? Our judgement of what is important in life - e.g. principles or standards? What value do you put on a human life?

Currently there are major conflicts (wars) in Ukraine / Russia, Israel / Palestine, Yemen, Sudan & Myanmar. The cost of those wars is counted in global military spending, direct financial suport & supply chain disruption costs. But there is more than a simple monetary cost. There is also the cost in terms of loss of life & injury, displacement & health, and the psychological & cultural cost for both sides of any war. On top of all of that there is the infrastructure damage, environmental damage & serious curtailment of civil liberties. 

As an example the monetary cost to Ukraine is thought to be £524 billion to the end of 2024. For Russia it is thought to be $450 billion, with Western sanctions estimated to result in $1.3 trillion in economic losses by 2025.

What on earth are we doing? We certainly aren't thinking logically. If we were we would be counting the cost in terms of human life lost & environmental damage. According to the British Ministry of Defence, more than one million Russian troops have been killed or injured since the full-scale invasion of Ukraine began on 24 February 2022.

What is the point of it all? In the end there will have to be negotiated peace - until the next time some leader decides that he, & it is always he, wants more territory & more power. 

I can only conclude that some human beings simply have an apocalyptic death wish.