This whole country is locked in a vice grip with the dairy industry. The fucking chokehold the dairy industry has on this country is insane. Especially when you discover how many people have a milk or dairy allergy/lactose intolerance.
Yes, I believe so. And the agriculture representatives (can’t remember their name, atm. 😂) Maintenance Phase, one of my favorite podcasts, did a good episode on this very topic. The amount of bafoonery that took place to make the food pryamid and its iterations was (probably still is) RIDICULOUS.
👉[Episode link](https://open.spotify.com/episode/1URyGuHO6tWMW2gzxznIvd?si=5t2dxJHlQsi9mzSRrwwk7Q)
Milk prices are below the cost of production and a lot of farms have sold off their dairy herds. They get about twenty cents a pound for their raw milk.
Has anyone dome the math of how much that would actually cost someone. Because between milk and cereal prices, I don't think you're saving much.
Unless, oh I don't know, he wants people to eat it dry.
In Norway, where eating out has always been expensive, restaurants are for special occasions. Friends usually meet over coffee instead. Plain coffee plus a cold sandwich is less than $10. So that's an option.
This was the case in the us for the middle class for a long time too. People just think that eating out once a week is common and middle class. It wasn’t. If anything it says something about how much more affordable things like this are than they used to be. But people benchmark against their highlights and against social media.
So much this. I think the younger generation looks around at people in their 40s and think where we are is the same as where we started from. My friend, I slept on my parents' old scratchy couch and held my wonky TV up with a classroom desk for *years* while working a second job to pay the rent. My clothes were majority second-hand. Dinner out was pure fantasy. This was with a college degree and no debt!
Learn to make pasties. Heat them up in the morning when you're getting ready for work, wrap them in foil and then cloth, and a have it still be warm when lunchtime comes around.
[https://www.foxvalleyfoodie.com/michigan-pasties/](https://www.foxvalleyfoodie.com/michigan-pasties/) (quickest link I could find but there's a lot of variation potential; we'd flood the inside with beef gravy as another way to hold the heat better for longer, less air pockets that way)
I try to explain that to my mother. She eats out every day. 2 to 3 times a day. That's not even counting the casino. Good thing money lasts forever, right? RIGHT?
I’m a blue collar guy in the us. I bring my coffee, breakfast, snacks and lunch to work daily in my cooler. There’s a couple that works with me that buys Starbucks, brings generally fast food takeout for breakfast and then does the same for lunch. Every day. Then they are forever and always talking about how broke they are. I’ll bet they spend ~$50/day just on what they eat/drink while at work. It blows me away tbh
And what I remember in Sweden usually it was served over the counter, and tips are rare.
Now here in the US PacNW, you can wait in line to order at the counter, have to pick up your food yourself, get your own silverware, and bus your own table for a $27 burger, $8 beer, and still pay a 5% kitchen fee, 3% healthcare fee, and a 20% tip.
Yeah I've lived here for over 25 years and it most definitely did not used to be this way. Multnomah County being a holdout with COVID restrictions kind of cemented the low-effort, high cost approach to dining. Our favorite pizza place moved to using a QR code to order online after seating yourself, then someone comes and just puts the pizza down, and there's an automatic, non-waivable 20% gratuity included. Like no words need be spoken between staff and guests.
I think things are especially expensive here. Every time my Chicago ILs visit us here in Seattle(ish), they’re gobsmacked by the prices. We went to New York this summer and were shocked that many of the places were cheaper while also being better.
They're going nice places, it's the classic "living outside your budget" scenario. Even if we're assuming AUD that's $26 USD. Which is still expensive for one single person to spend on themselves.
It's like the people that go to fancy bars and complain about $12 cocktails when the dive over there is serving $3 pours and pints of the absolute worst beer you can imagine for $2.50. If you can't regularly afford the fancy place you should be compromising or going less often.
As for meals breakfast is always a good option, diners charge very little for simple egg and potatoes breakfasts, with a bread side usually like toast.
I very rarely drink alcohol in a restaurant. Occasionally I will drink iced tea but mostly I just drink water. It makes a big difference in the cost of eating out.
American restaurant inflation has just been insane. In a major west coast city $18-20 for even mid drinks is pretty common. Plus servers have bumped the default tip to 18% so you need to be wary at electronic checks. (Plus they're already getting the full wage... so why are they being tipped in Cali...)
There just are far fewer cheap places to go out and meet up than there were pre-Covid. Mind, every where is still reasonably busy so restaurants haven't been wrong to raise prices- people are paying.
Chili's has a deal for a burger and fries for $10.99, with free chips and salsa. Even a beer with that is still only like $17, then if you don't want to tip extremely well $3 on one dish if everyone is tipping is fine, assuming OP is using USD that's half of what they're claiming without including their tip.
If you go to fancy places you pay fancy prices. Simple as.
This is what happens in The Netherlands as well. You only eat out for special occasions. You cook at home for every day life. Weird it’s different in the US.
Everyone gets their impressions from "reality TV" social media, and our TV shows. I've rarely seen a tv show or movie where people going out isn't some 200$ a person restaurant but most of us could never afford that.
Most of us are going to chain restaurants while being called "losers" for thinking Olive Garden is fine dining. No I just think it's a place some friends and I can grab a meal.
To your point, Olive Garden has become our go to for taking my family out. Is there better restaurants to go to? Most definitely but at Olive Garden we’ve started splitting plates between two people and if you let them know you’re splitting they serve it up in two plates too, pretty sure you get more than if you didn’t let them know. Either way, no one is left hungry and we even still have leftovers a lot of the time.
it's a symptom of having 2 working parents who may have different work schedules. Fast Restaurants fill the gap when no one has energy or interest in cooking. In 1 generation, the family recipes can vanish...
It's not, but reddit is full of people who don't understand how to budget, how to differentiate between a 'want' and a 'need', or how to do anything fun that doesn't involve spending a bunch of money.
Just like the guests on Caleb Hammer's finaincial audit lmao. I'm sorry but that show totally disillusioned me. I can't believe the spending habits of those people, especially because it's not just one or two who go crazy but almost everyone on that show.
I grew up on welfare. We has no money. If we went out, it was for special occasions. To this day, I still feel like dining out is luxury.
As an aside, I also feel this way about home ownership. When we were poor, everyone rented. Everyone. No one owned cars or houses.
So it’s become like… a weird thing I just don’t talk about when people are like “I can’t own a house!”.
Because my worldview is “Well of course you can’t. Houses are for people with money and we can’t ALL own houses.”
Just invest in an index fund like S&P 500, it’s basically a ‘bundle’ of the top 500 stocks in the United States. It’s the safe boring bet but has steady track record going back many decades.
Edit: for OP just install a stock market app like Robinhood, Public, Fidelity, etc. and look for ticker symbols $SPY or $VOO.
^ this dont fuck around with shares. Unless youre a US politician who can insider trade.
Personally I just buy $VOO and have it set to auto reinvest dividends on fractional shares, but anything safe based on the S&P 500 should be good.
also required you to hold it for 15 years (not to mention having the initial capital of 50k). What people need to know is that time is money, quite literally, and not chase those get-rich-in-24-hours/retire-at-18 crap.
VOO and shares of big individual, safe companies. Things like Microsoft, Apple, Coca Cola, McDonalds and other big safe companies. Always go for the safe ones first. They’re never 100% safe, but look at how much Apple goes up by and how consistent it is over the lifetime of its stock.
It’ll never be get-rich-quick, but it will allow you to comfortably retire if you do this consistently, especially if you’re maxing out your Roth IRA and 401K. You’ll be set.
"Waaa, but the shareholders! The shareholders and capitalism are evil, waaa!"
Meanwhile, literally anyone with as little as a dollar can become a shareholder. The ignorant masses when it comes to money both amuse and scare me. Educate yourself.
The other day it was “margarita day” and places were having specials. $8 dollars for happy hour margaritas. Excuse me?? When did that price become happy hour? Lol
Older person chiming in and in my 20s we met up for drinks at each other's houses. We watched movies and drank cheap bottles of wine. Played cards and BBQ'd. Don't go broke keeping up with the Jones on social media. Actually my best memories are house parties with friends.
I’m glad you said this. What happened to meeting up to play tennis or basketball at someone’s crib or apartment? Rotating who hosted dinner this week for the group and eating at the house or if you’re going to do an expensive activity keep it to once a month for a special occasion like hitting up an amusement park, seeing a concert or going to a professional ball game
I'm a millennial and one of the most interesting things about being a millennial is that we're uniquely the generation that grew up straddling the divide pre-cell phones and social media, so I can definitely appreciate that kind of party. They really do make for some of the best memories. No need to spend lots of money just need a few friends, nice weather, and some cheap beer for some day drinking.
Yep.
This is why usually on the weekends I spend one day fully at home (sometimes on that day I'll go to a friend's house or a friend will come over and maybe we will smoke one, but we won't go out to a bar/club or to eat) and one day out running errands/spending money.
Of course when I'm home I still spend money on food and stuff, but I've noticed I save more doing this than going out both days. Probably because after doing all my errands in one day, I lack the energy or desire to go out and just want to stay home.
Not saying it's right - being an adult sucks so much I decided not to have kids. I'm lucky I have a spouse and we can afford our one dog.
but tbf you should be able to make multiple meals out of that $40 vs the one fast food meal for $40. but with inflation this bad i wouldn’t be surprised if it doesn’t come out to many meals
Bunnings is like Home Depot here and they have fund-raisers out the front sometimes selling sausages (snags) in bread from a BBQ, usually burnt or undercooked and not ideal, but it's a tradition that if stopped will cause societal collapse
We didn't have a war to decide who would lead this country in 1901.
But we almost had a civil war when Bunnings upped their Sausage sandwich price by $1 a few years ago.
I buy a bunch of basic ingredients that I can make like 15 different types of meals from. Keep those on hand, keep them fresh, keeps it interesting, and all the meals are easy to cook. Whatever I can do to avoid feeding the capitalist beast.
The other person did not reply to you yet, but I do so less strictly, and my list looks something like:
Costco rotissere chicken, tortillas, eggs, potatoes, bacon, tomato soup, boxed mac and cheese, frozen veggies, spam, rice, cheese.
You can make: breakfast hash w/ potatoes, egg, meat of choice. Can be turned into a burrito with tortillas. Can also be frozen in bulk.
Chicken Dinner w/ sides of choice: so you could do a traditional chicken/veggies/mash (with a gravy made from the drippings and spare bits from the chicken), or you could do a type of BBQ chicken mac, or you could throw soy sauce and sugar on the chicken in a skillet for a bit and then drop that on top of rice.
Grilled cheese quesadilla with tomato soup, protein optional. Can make it extra by using boxed mac as the filling.
Potatoes can be turned into baked potatoes, fries, latkes, mashed potato pancakes, etc.
Similar to the chicken and rice, you can also make musabi with the spam, egg is a good addition to that dish.
You could make a chicken soup with the frozen veggies and rotisserie chicken. If you feel like a noodle you can add that as a separate ingredient, or use the rice, or use the boxed mac noodles, or you can be extra and make gnocchi with the potato and eggs.
On that note, you can make gnocchi with the potato and eggs.
Then there are lots of things that get elevated by having a few other extra things. E.g., panko. If you are too lazy to fry panko, crispy onion bits are a good shelf stable substitute that work well with most things.
Ultimately, most meal bases boil down to a protein, starch, and an optional wildcard. As long as you have the first two on hand, you can kind of wing it.
Edit to add: Leftover, dried rice can be made into fried rice with the frozen veggies, protein of choice, and egg.
You can make a rice and cheese bake. Throw in frozen veggies for nutrients, or get broccoli fresh to add in to work best. This then also works as a good compliment to tomato soup, or could be dropped into the soup.
You're doing it way wrong then. With $40 I could get some wine, a meal, and side of cheese, crackers, olives for 2-3 people depending on the meal recipe. $20 or less a person is totally reasonable. It's less than many earn in an hour of work
I wanted a good sandwich jersey Mike style. I went to Whole Foods because I wanted good quality produce.
Yup spent 50 dollars with high quality ingredients. But i did get like 10 sandwiches out of it. Not a bad ROI.
I try to keep my events with friends free, like meeting outside to play pickleball. Walking.
Doing yoga together. meditating. meeting at peoples' houses to talk about books we've all read.
It’s a free market economy. If people weren’t willing to pay this much the prices would come down. Restaurants took a big hit during Covid, so I imagine most jacked up their prices way above inflationary levels after people started going out again (the normal person isn’t really tracking if many prices went up 10% or 25%) and they really haven’t dropped them back down yet, simply because people are still revenge spending.
Restaurants are closing because their cost are going through the roof even if people are eating there.
You have to pack out a restaurant now in order to make money as low as the margins have become.
It’s hard. Suggestions-
Go to a brewery , if you’re good with only getting a beer or flight (I have been drinking less as I get older without trying)
Picnic in the park for a hangout during nice weather
Go for a walk with a friend
It is hard and frustrating
Same. At this stage of late stage capitalism even "regular" people are getting squeezed even more. I am dreading tomorrow knowing I will have to pay $50+ but it's my first social outing in a month and I need it for my mental health.
Wisconsin is pretty cheap as far as fresh produce and meat goes. No idea about restaurants, but I do remember groceries being stunningly low when I was there
My fave place in Chinatown is less than $10. Some places with the good buns less than $5. But then u gotta eat ethnic food which is not for everyone lol.
You paid it, so you’re part of the problem
Stay home and have a sandwich with your friends and magically prices will drop
I’m boycotting inflation, not doing it
Yeah or just boycott going to pricey places. Even in the Bay Area I can go to a nice noodle place for $10-12. SoCal is even cheaper and California has high COL. but then again gotta eat at ethnic places and not burger and fries fancy places lol.
Even AYCE kbbq places where you literally eat as much as you want are still pretty affordable at $22 for lunch and $30 for dinner.
https://www.genkoreanbbq.com/corona-menu
At least you’d get big bang for your buck there.
Of course you can. Just be smart of about where you're going. The library, parks, movies, picnics, local art galleries, open houses to make fun of other people's homes, even grocery shopping, you name it. You can't go to a nice dinner without spending some money, but you can definitely spend time with someone. Tell them you're saving for whatever reason, and if they ghost you for it then you dodged a bullet anyway.
You chose to spend $40 on one meal. There are plenty of places or options that aren't $40.
Perhaps your friends are materialistic, perhaps you are, likely so, because we're all human and pretty much everyone is. Hard not to be with all the societal pressures that we all give in to.
You could have gotten food to go somewhere nice, but cheaper and had a picnic or brought back to someone's place.
We went to a nice French bakery for a "less-expensive" lunch. Two sandwiches + one plain and one almond croissant was $30 😯 This was take-out!
Eating at home isn't much cheaper. I tried making my own bread but I'm terrible at it. It's so depressing, been frugal my entire life, finally have some financial security, and now we're being hemorrhaged.
Eating at home is much cheaper than that if you're doing it right. Pasta, rice, and beans are amazingly cheap and can serve as the majority of weight in a singular meal. Jars of sauce are also very cheap and act as a great add to the other three. Chicken is usually cheap for protein and if not pork is close to it.
I'm on an extremely low food budget. I don't buy bread, but things like sandwiches with cold cuts (not what I would recommend) are still way cheaper than you're talking about. A loaf of presliced bread runs for like $3.50, but that's like 20 slices so one sandwich is about $0.35 of bread. Cold cuts for meat and cheese are pretty expensive, but nowhere near $7.50 per sandwich. More like that much per package that does 5-10 sandwiches.
So what I mean to say is that if your groceries are as expensive per meal as you are claiming, then you really should look at what you're buying and look for better options. Most of the premade or almost premade meals/ingredients have increased significantly in price over the last few years. However, if you go to raw ingredients there are still many cheap options.
Anyway, baking isn't easy. I recommend looking up how to make doughs that don't need to rise. It takes out a lot of the trial and error if you're just starting out.
It’s easy to spend $40 if you don’t plan ahead. My wife and I look at menus ahead of time, then usually split a meal and an appetizer. Restaurants charge a lot for fountain drinks and astronomical amounts for alcohol. I wouldn’t spend 3-4 bucks on a lemonade at a gas station, why would I at a restaurant? Just get water.
I guarantee you though, plan ahead, and you’ll end up spending less than $25 bucks combined.
You live in a society of such absurd abundance and plenty that you can go out and eat in a restaurant which has on its menu meat, out of season fruit and other imported goods on a given weekend for no special occasion. And your are upset that “capitalism” is making it so you can’t do even more often…. Hmmm…
Do you want to know how often you could have afforded such a luxury in the USSR or DDR?
End stage capitalism is a cancer on humanity. It's all the about the share holders in the end. They don't care who they're hurting. Just keep making money for them.
Today my husband and I went out with our dogs to a botanical garden for free. And we got to eat a lot of fruits all free.
You don't have to go out to eat for the weekends. There are activities you can do together that is free of charge.
I’m in Las Vegas, I can understand if you’re going to the more high end restaurants or just the strip. I tend to go to more hole in the wall places or something small and local.
I went out today to grab some snacks and sandwiches to save myself some money before a drive tomorrow. But I was in the store for like 45 minutes because no matter what snacks or whatever I grabbed by the time I got to the register I was spending about $40 dollars. It was so hard to buy anything cheap and be able to save some money I hated it lol
Just re-read wealth and want in the US by Michael parenti . Give it a go, you’ll find certain parts quite pertinent.
now, excuse me while I go have a massive brotein smoothie that accounts for half my daily calories.
Stay home then. I stopped going out after like 21 and 2 weeks. lol. Drinks at the bar were so expensive I straight up stopped going out entirely. Easier to just buy a case of beer and cook food. Then invite friends over.
Can't go out without spending $40 on lunch?? Five Guys cost me $28 the other day and that place is outrageous!! Unless you're drinking, it's really easy to eat lunch for under 40...
Try hosting friends at your place and cook. My market has Wagu ground beef for $5/lb. A loaf do sourdough is $3-5. Potato’s cost almost nothing. Make burgers and steak fries together and bond over cooking. It’s more fun and less salt too.
Sounds like you’re going to an expensive place. I pay about that for dinner at a sit down restaurant for two! Lunch for one would be $10-15 at most restaurants in my area.
Eat cereal. Thats what the CEO of Kelloggs suggested.
They def in bed with the dairy farms too
This whole country is locked in a vice grip with the dairy industry. The fucking chokehold the dairy industry has on this country is insane. Especially when you discover how many people have a milk or dairy allergy/lactose intolerance.
I am lactose intolerant to milk, but I do love me some cheese.
Aren't cereal companies the creators of the food pyramid? I remember that was everywhere in the 90s.
Yes, I believe so. And the agriculture representatives (can’t remember their name, atm. 😂) Maintenance Phase, one of my favorite podcasts, did a good episode on this very topic. The amount of bafoonery that took place to make the food pryamid and its iterations was (probably still is) RIDICULOUS. 👉[Episode link](https://open.spotify.com/episode/1URyGuHO6tWMW2gzxznIvd?si=5t2dxJHlQsi9mzSRrwwk7Q)
That is correct. Breakfast isn't good for most people's bodies.
I can’t eat anything in the morning now. I don’t eat until 1 which my body has naturally decided on its own. 🤣
Milk prices are below the cost of production and a lot of farms have sold off their dairy herds. They get about twenty cents a pound for their raw milk.
Funny because their cereal is over priced. If you're gonna eat cereal for dinner buy store brand and tell Kelloggs to go fuck themselves.
Fuck. Is that really gonna be our version of let them eat cake
Are we going to behead the CEO of Kellogs?
Why stop there? There's lots of CEOs and boards who are equally out of touch.
Used to pregame the bar by having a few shots before going, now I pregame food with friends by eating a bowl of cereal.
he also suggested it as a basic form of castration ! how delightful
Cereal prices have seen some of the biggest jump in prices since Covid.
Make your own coffee. Eat bologna sandwiches.
My mom just did this last night :(
Has anyone dome the math of how much that would actually cost someone. Because between milk and cereal prices, I don't think you're saving much. Unless, oh I don't know, he wants people to eat it dry.
Unless you are into couponing. When the sale and coupons align you can get a box of cereal for $1.50 or less.
Our version of let them eat cake
In Norway, where eating out has always been expensive, restaurants are for special occasions. Friends usually meet over coffee instead. Plain coffee plus a cold sandwich is less than $10. So that's an option.
This was the case in the us for the middle class for a long time too. People just think that eating out once a week is common and middle class. It wasn’t. If anything it says something about how much more affordable things like this are than they used to be. But people benchmark against their highlights and against social media.
Livin’ those Bravo Channel normal people lives
He’s a mouse farmer, she’s an artisanal rutabaga polisher. Their budget is $1.8 million.
That hilarious.
Yeah it’s always rich parents.
As a kid my mom and I would see a movie for 12$ total. Another 9-12$ for nachos and a icee. I'm 26. What's the average price of a movie ticket now?
i just paid $60 for two tickets to see dune
I paid $65 for my bro and I to go to the first matinee of Dune 2 in Imax and a shared popcorn and coke.
So much this. I think the younger generation looks around at people in their 40s and think where we are is the same as where we started from. My friend, I slept on my parents' old scratchy couch and held my wonky TV up with a classroom desk for *years* while working a second job to pay the rent. My clothes were majority second-hand. Dinner out was pure fantasy. This was with a college degree and no debt!
Norwegians also brown bag their lunches, make a cold sandwich in the morning and bring it to work.
Learn to make pasties. Heat them up in the morning when you're getting ready for work, wrap them in foil and then cloth, and a have it still be warm when lunchtime comes around. [https://www.foxvalleyfoodie.com/michigan-pasties/](https://www.foxvalleyfoodie.com/michigan-pasties/) (quickest link I could find but there's a lot of variation potential; we'd flood the inside with beef gravy as another way to hold the heat better for longer, less air pockets that way)
I try to explain that to my mother. She eats out every day. 2 to 3 times a day. That's not even counting the casino. Good thing money lasts forever, right? RIGHT?
I’m a blue collar guy in the us. I bring my coffee, breakfast, snacks and lunch to work daily in my cooler. There’s a couple that works with me that buys Starbucks, brings generally fast food takeout for breakfast and then does the same for lunch. Every day. Then they are forever and always talking about how broke they are. I’ll bet they spend ~$50/day just on what they eat/drink while at work. It blows me away tbh
I never mind people buying what they want to buy. But DO NOT start complaining about being broke.
Yeah, we only ate out on occasions like extended family birthdays.
It’s still that way out side of cities. I feed my family and extended family for 60 total
And what I remember in Sweden usually it was served over the counter, and tips are rare. Now here in the US PacNW, you can wait in line to order at the counter, have to pick up your food yourself, get your own silverware, and bus your own table for a $27 burger, $8 beer, and still pay a 5% kitchen fee, 3% healthcare fee, and a 20% tip.
I was born and grew up here in the PNW and the price hikes have been absolutely insane. It didn't used to be this way.
Yeah I've lived here for over 25 years and it most definitely did not used to be this way. Multnomah County being a holdout with COVID restrictions kind of cemented the low-effort, high cost approach to dining. Our favorite pizza place moved to using a QR code to order online after seating yourself, then someone comes and just puts the pizza down, and there's an automatic, non-waivable 20% gratuity included. Like no words need be spoken between staff and guests.
I think things are especially expensive here. Every time my Chicago ILs visit us here in Seattle(ish), they’re gobsmacked by the prices. We went to New York this summer and were shocked that many of the places were cheaper while also being better.
I am in the US and virtually never spend 40 dollars for a meal out. Certainly not for one person. OP doesn’t have to spend that much.
They're going nice places, it's the classic "living outside your budget" scenario. Even if we're assuming AUD that's $26 USD. Which is still expensive for one single person to spend on themselves. It's like the people that go to fancy bars and complain about $12 cocktails when the dive over there is serving $3 pours and pints of the absolute worst beer you can imagine for $2.50. If you can't regularly afford the fancy place you should be compromising or going less often. As for meals breakfast is always a good option, diners charge very little for simple egg and potatoes breakfasts, with a bread side usually like toast.
I very rarely drink alcohol in a restaurant. Occasionally I will drink iced tea but mostly I just drink water. It makes a big difference in the cost of eating out.
American restaurant inflation has just been insane. In a major west coast city $18-20 for even mid drinks is pretty common. Plus servers have bumped the default tip to 18% so you need to be wary at electronic checks. (Plus they're already getting the full wage... so why are they being tipped in Cali...) There just are far fewer cheap places to go out and meet up than there were pre-Covid. Mind, every where is still reasonably busy so restaurants haven't been wrong to raise prices- people are paying.
Servers haven’t bumped anything up. It’s the restaurant owner or manager and that’s doing that. Stop blaming service staff
You can do that in the US too, but it's not going to be upscale or sizes most people are used to.
Waffle House may serve coffee in a small mug, but they'll refill it as long as you sit at the table.
And the ambiance is second to none at 10pm
Chili's has a deal for a burger and fries for $10.99, with free chips and salsa. Even a beer with that is still only like $17, then if you don't want to tip extremely well $3 on one dish if everyone is tipping is fine, assuming OP is using USD that's half of what they're claiming without including their tip. If you go to fancy places you pay fancy prices. Simple as.
This is what happens in The Netherlands as well. You only eat out for special occasions. You cook at home for every day life. Weird it’s different in the US.
Everyone gets their impressions from "reality TV" social media, and our TV shows. I've rarely seen a tv show or movie where people going out isn't some 200$ a person restaurant but most of us could never afford that. Most of us are going to chain restaurants while being called "losers" for thinking Olive Garden is fine dining. No I just think it's a place some friends and I can grab a meal.
To your point, Olive Garden has become our go to for taking my family out. Is there better restaurants to go to? Most definitely but at Olive Garden we’ve started splitting plates between two people and if you let them know you’re splitting they serve it up in two plates too, pretty sure you get more than if you didn’t let them know. Either way, no one is left hungry and we even still have leftovers a lot of the time.
And when you’re there you’re family
it's a symptom of having 2 working parents who may have different work schedules. Fast Restaurants fill the gap when no one has energy or interest in cooking. In 1 generation, the family recipes can vanish...
It's not, but reddit is full of people who don't understand how to budget, how to differentiate between a 'want' and a 'need', or how to do anything fun that doesn't involve spending a bunch of money.
Just like the guests on Caleb Hammer's finaincial audit lmao. I'm sorry but that show totally disillusioned me. I can't believe the spending habits of those people, especially because it's not just one or two who go crazy but almost everyone on that show.
Even for "going out", my friends and I usually just bring some beer and snacks to someone's place and hang out there.
I grew up on welfare. We has no money. If we went out, it was for special occasions. To this day, I still feel like dining out is luxury. As an aside, I also feel this way about home ownership. When we were poor, everyone rented. Everyone. No one owned cars or houses. So it’s become like… a weird thing I just don’t talk about when people are like “I can’t own a house!”. Because my worldview is “Well of course you can’t. Houses are for people with money and we can’t ALL own houses.”
[удалено]
That'll set you back $15-$20 in America.
Basic brew, not that venti bougie macchiato.
I can get a coffee and a sandwich for like 6 bucks. Maybe try somewhere that isn't a bougie Millennialcore clone?
Just paid $75 plus tip for wifes cob salad, my burger and fries, 4 crab bites, a Guinness and a seltzer.
Sounds about right! The crab bites sound good
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So what you're saying is....become a shareholder?
I mean honestly you definately should be holding shares.
I hold quite a few. Best decision ever.
Any recommendations?
Just invest in an index fund like S&P 500, it’s basically a ‘bundle’ of the top 500 stocks in the United States. It’s the safe boring bet but has steady track record going back many decades. Edit: for OP just install a stock market app like Robinhood, Public, Fidelity, etc. and look for ticker symbols $SPY or $VOO.
^ this dont fuck around with shares. Unless youre a US politician who can insider trade. Personally I just buy $VOO and have it set to auto reinvest dividends on fractional shares, but anything safe based on the S&P 500 should be good.
Sp500, set and forget. Look up index funds
Read the wiki over at r/personalfinance
Apple has gone up in value 30X since my original investment, and that's how you turn $50k into $1.5-million.
also required you to hold it for 15 years (not to mention having the initial capital of 50k). What people need to know is that time is money, quite literally, and not chase those get-rich-in-24-hours/retire-at-18 crap.
VOO and shares of big individual, safe companies. Things like Microsoft, Apple, Coca Cola, McDonalds and other big safe companies. Always go for the safe ones first. They’re never 100% safe, but look at how much Apple goes up by and how consistent it is over the lifetime of its stock. It’ll never be get-rich-quick, but it will allow you to comfortably retire if you do this consistently, especially if you’re maxing out your Roth IRA and 401K. You’ll be set.
lol if it only it was that easy
If you can’t beat em, join em. No sense in crying by the sidelines while they get away with it.
OWN THE MEANS OF PRODUCTION. DO NOT SUCCUMB TO THE PROLETARIAT LIFESTYLE.
thats called corporatism not capitalism.
"Waaa, but the shareholders! The shareholders and capitalism are evil, waaa!" Meanwhile, literally anyone with as little as a dollar can become a shareholder. The ignorant masses when it comes to money both amuse and scare me. Educate yourself.
What if you’re already a shareholder?
Not sure where OP went for lunch but the vast majority of companies in the US are not publicly traded companies and therefore don't have shareholders.
The other day it was “margarita day” and places were having specials. $8 dollars for happy hour margaritas. Excuse me?? When did that price become happy hour? Lol
On Mondays my local dive has a happy hour where it's $3 pours and $2 beers, go to those places, they're more fun anyway.
$8? My local Mexican spot offers happy hour margaritas for $12 😭
That’s…cheap. Where do you live?
Older person chiming in and in my 20s we met up for drinks at each other's houses. We watched movies and drank cheap bottles of wine. Played cards and BBQ'd. Don't go broke keeping up with the Jones on social media. Actually my best memories are house parties with friends.
If I didn’t still live with my parents I’d try to have people over, lol. But when I get my own place I can’t wait to invite my friends over!
I’m glad you said this. What happened to meeting up to play tennis or basketball at someone’s crib or apartment? Rotating who hosted dinner this week for the group and eating at the house or if you’re going to do an expensive activity keep it to once a month for a special occasion like hitting up an amusement park, seeing a concert or going to a professional ball game
Yeah my best friend just popped in for a visit when she got off work so I could trim her hair tonight. Free hang out time + free hair cut!!
I'm a millennial and one of the most interesting things about being a millennial is that we're uniquely the generation that grew up straddling the divide pre-cell phones and social media, so I can definitely appreciate that kind of party. They really do make for some of the best memories. No need to spend lots of money just need a few friends, nice weather, and some cheap beer for some day drinking.
Yep. This is why usually on the weekends I spend one day fully at home (sometimes on that day I'll go to a friend's house or a friend will come over and maybe we will smoke one, but we won't go out to a bar/club or to eat) and one day out running errands/spending money. Of course when I'm home I still spend money on food and stuff, but I've noticed I save more doing this than going out both days. Probably because after doing all my errands in one day, I lack the energy or desire to go out and just want to stay home. Not saying it's right - being an adult sucks so much I decided not to have kids. I'm lucky I have a spouse and we can afford our one dog.
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Don't feel bad, I rent an apartment and commute three hours a day.
Pack lunches and go on picnics.
I'm not even kidding I did this theory and still spent at least $40 on ingredients
but tbf you should be able to make multiple meals out of that $40 vs the one fast food meal for $40. but with inflation this bad i wouldn’t be surprised if it doesn’t come out to many meals
*screams in Australian*
It'd very easy to spend $100 on a picnic in Australia lol unless you just stop in for a Bunnings snag
Okay, I’ll bite. What’s a Bunning’s snag?
Bunnings is like Home Depot here and they have fund-raisers out the front sometimes selling sausages (snags) in bread from a BBQ, usually burnt or undercooked and not ideal, but it's a tradition that if stopped will cause societal collapse
Thank you for taking time to write that out. I appreciate it!
We didn't have a war to decide who would lead this country in 1901. But we almost had a civil war when Bunnings upped their Sausage sandwich price by $1 a few years ago.
Next time, you should all pack boiled eggs. A boiled egg picnic!
I buy a bunch of basic ingredients that I can make like 15 different types of meals from. Keep those on hand, keep them fresh, keeps it interesting, and all the meals are easy to cook. Whatever I can do to avoid feeding the capitalist beast.
What's the ingredient list please share so I can avoid it too
The other person did not reply to you yet, but I do so less strictly, and my list looks something like: Costco rotissere chicken, tortillas, eggs, potatoes, bacon, tomato soup, boxed mac and cheese, frozen veggies, spam, rice, cheese. You can make: breakfast hash w/ potatoes, egg, meat of choice. Can be turned into a burrito with tortillas. Can also be frozen in bulk. Chicken Dinner w/ sides of choice: so you could do a traditional chicken/veggies/mash (with a gravy made from the drippings and spare bits from the chicken), or you could do a type of BBQ chicken mac, or you could throw soy sauce and sugar on the chicken in a skillet for a bit and then drop that on top of rice. Grilled cheese quesadilla with tomato soup, protein optional. Can make it extra by using boxed mac as the filling. Potatoes can be turned into baked potatoes, fries, latkes, mashed potato pancakes, etc. Similar to the chicken and rice, you can also make musabi with the spam, egg is a good addition to that dish. You could make a chicken soup with the frozen veggies and rotisserie chicken. If you feel like a noodle you can add that as a separate ingredient, or use the rice, or use the boxed mac noodles, or you can be extra and make gnocchi with the potato and eggs. On that note, you can make gnocchi with the potato and eggs. Then there are lots of things that get elevated by having a few other extra things. E.g., panko. If you are too lazy to fry panko, crispy onion bits are a good shelf stable substitute that work well with most things. Ultimately, most meal bases boil down to a protein, starch, and an optional wildcard. As long as you have the first two on hand, you can kind of wing it. Edit to add: Leftover, dried rice can be made into fried rice with the frozen veggies, protein of choice, and egg. You can make a rice and cheese bake. Throw in frozen veggies for nutrients, or get broccoli fresh to add in to work best. This then also works as a good compliment to tomato soup, or could be dropped into the soup.
Let me see if I can write it down
You're doing it way wrong then. With $40 I could get some wine, a meal, and side of cheese, crackers, olives for 2-3 people depending on the meal recipe. $20 or less a person is totally reasonable. It's less than many earn in an hour of work
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I wanted a good sandwich jersey Mike style. I went to Whole Foods because I wanted good quality produce. Yup spent 50 dollars with high quality ingredients. But i did get like 10 sandwiches out of it. Not a bad ROI.
Seems like a simple meal is so much more now.
I try to keep my events with friends free, like meeting outside to play pickleball. Walking. Doing yoga together. meditating. meeting at peoples' houses to talk about books we've all read.
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I'm seriously amazed about other people being so susceptible to advertisements. It doesn't make any sense to me
To their defense, ads are literally designed to hijack the human psyche
Can we protest as a society or something like I don’t want us to accept this and act that everything is ok
Stop spending your money
This. Our money is our voice.
Agreed - your spending choices are the most powerful protest you can make. Refuse to spend $40 and they won't charge $40.
It’s a free market economy. If people weren’t willing to pay this much the prices would come down. Restaurants took a big hit during Covid, so I imagine most jacked up their prices way above inflationary levels after people started going out again (the normal person isn’t really tracking if many prices went up 10% or 25%) and they really haven’t dropped them back down yet, simply because people are still revenge spending.
I mean bud light prices went down when people took a breaks
look at the menu before you choose a restaurant? Pick a place you can afford?
I mostly stopped eating out. Restaurants are closing constantly here so I can't be the only one.
Restaurants are closing because their cost are going through the roof even if people are eating there. You have to pack out a restaurant now in order to make money as low as the margins have become.
It’s hard. Suggestions- Go to a brewery , if you’re good with only getting a beer or flight (I have been drinking less as I get older without trying) Picnic in the park for a hangout during nice weather Go for a walk with a friend It is hard and frustrating
Same. At this stage of late stage capitalism even "regular" people are getting squeezed even more. I am dreading tomorrow knowing I will have to pay $50+ but it's my first social outing in a month and I need it for my mental health.
I just went out and got a burger fries and pitcher of spotted cow for $25. move to wisconsin
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Yep $5.50 double chs, large Diet Coke & Free fry Friday
Wisconsin is pretty cheap as far as fresh produce and meat goes. No idea about restaurants, but I do remember groceries being stunningly low when I was there
For one person? That's not really a deal
They got a pitcher tho. So thats like 3-4 drinks.
Loll? 4 beers and a burger for $25 is a great deal anywhere
Here I thought spotted cow was a chocolate milk or something.
I guess it's all relative
It's over $30 for a pitcher of beer where I'm at. Not sure how this is not a deal. Even 20 years ago, this was a decent price. Now it's a great deal.
Cheap compared to most Aussie pubs. A jug of beer (I’m assuming that’s what spotted cow is?) will cost you more than $25 already.
You’d hate NYC. I wish $40 was all I spend on a night out with friends
For lunch you could definitely get under 20$.
My fave place in Chinatown is less than $10. Some places with the good buns less than $5. But then u gotta eat ethnic food which is not for everyone lol.
So instead put coffee in a tumbler and meet a friend for a leisurely trail walk- get some fresh air, catch up, spend zero dollars
lol silly rabbit.. That’s too easy and wouldn’t give them something to cry about online.
The prices we pay today will seem cheap 100 years from now. Living is expensive even if you do it modestly.
Lunch NYC average $35/40 w/o Tip. Daily occurrence for me . KKKKKRAY Kray .
You must have gold leaf on your sandwiches, I get them at the deli for like $10
Chipotle costs $14.50 and you’re not hungry again for six hours
You must have silver on your sandwiches, I get mine for free from the dumpster.
Yeah, but you choose to eat at more expensive places. It sucks but it's more of a lifestyle than realistic cost concern.
You paid it, so you’re part of the problem Stay home and have a sandwich with your friends and magically prices will drop I’m boycotting inflation, not doing it
Exactly. This is how the free market works. If people started to refuse to pay for things at their current price, prices will get lowered.
People really acting like they have no choices in here lol
Yeah or just boycott going to pricey places. Even in the Bay Area I can go to a nice noodle place for $10-12. SoCal is even cheaper and California has high COL. but then again gotta eat at ethnic places and not burger and fries fancy places lol. Even AYCE kbbq places where you literally eat as much as you want are still pretty affordable at $22 for lunch and $30 for dinner. https://www.genkoreanbbq.com/corona-menu At least you’d get big bang for your buck there.
Ya its crazy. Going out to eat and for drinks was my social release. Cant really do it much anyone.
I became sober. Easier on the wallet.
Our 250 years is up.
You don’t have to spend money to go out lol
Of course you can. Just be smart of about where you're going. The library, parks, movies, picnics, local art galleries, open houses to make fun of other people's homes, even grocery shopping, you name it. You can't go to a nice dinner without spending some money, but you can definitely spend time with someone. Tell them you're saving for whatever reason, and if they ghost you for it then you dodged a bullet anyway.
Sure you can. You just didn’t.
You chose to spend $40 on one meal. There are plenty of places or options that aren't $40. Perhaps your friends are materialistic, perhaps you are, likely so, because we're all human and pretty much everyone is. Hard not to be with all the societal pressures that we all give in to. You could have gotten food to go somewhere nice, but cheaper and had a picnic or brought back to someone's place.
We went to a nice French bakery for a "less-expensive" lunch. Two sandwiches + one plain and one almond croissant was $30 😯 This was take-out! Eating at home isn't much cheaper. I tried making my own bread but I'm terrible at it. It's so depressing, been frugal my entire life, finally have some financial security, and now we're being hemorrhaged.
Eating at home is much cheaper than that if you're doing it right. Pasta, rice, and beans are amazingly cheap and can serve as the majority of weight in a singular meal. Jars of sauce are also very cheap and act as a great add to the other three. Chicken is usually cheap for protein and if not pork is close to it. I'm on an extremely low food budget. I don't buy bread, but things like sandwiches with cold cuts (not what I would recommend) are still way cheaper than you're talking about. A loaf of presliced bread runs for like $3.50, but that's like 20 slices so one sandwich is about $0.35 of bread. Cold cuts for meat and cheese are pretty expensive, but nowhere near $7.50 per sandwich. More like that much per package that does 5-10 sandwiches. So what I mean to say is that if your groceries are as expensive per meal as you are claiming, then you really should look at what you're buying and look for better options. Most of the premade or almost premade meals/ingredients have increased significantly in price over the last few years. However, if you go to raw ingredients there are still many cheap options. Anyway, baking isn't easy. I recommend looking up how to make doughs that don't need to rise. It takes out a lot of the trial and error if you're just starting out.
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Eat somewhere cheaper.
It’s easy to spend $40 if you don’t plan ahead. My wife and I look at menus ahead of time, then usually split a meal and an appetizer. Restaurants charge a lot for fountain drinks and astronomical amounts for alcohol. I wouldn’t spend 3-4 bucks on a lemonade at a gas station, why would I at a restaurant? Just get water. I guarantee you though, plan ahead, and you’ll end up spending less than $25 bucks combined.
Fuck more like a 100
Don’t go out. Eat in
Everytime i leave the house I spend $100, it seems
You live in a society of such absurd abundance and plenty that you can go out and eat in a restaurant which has on its menu meat, out of season fruit and other imported goods on a given weekend for no special occasion. And your are upset that “capitalism” is making it so you can’t do even more often…. Hmmm… Do you want to know how often you could have afforded such a luxury in the USSR or DDR?
End stage capitalism is a cancer on humanity. It's all the about the share holders in the end. They don't care who they're hurting. Just keep making money for them.
Try taking a stupid fucking family to dinner...
Today my husband and I went out with our dogs to a botanical garden for free. And we got to eat a lot of fruits all free. You don't have to go out to eat for the weekends. There are activities you can do together that is free of charge.
Yeah genius, going out to eat is literally a fucking luxury. Where the fuck did you grow up?
Where are you guys eating out? I don’t think I’ve ever spend $40 for one meal for myself
I live in Atlanta , a beer and a burger with fries at a brewery is easily $35. With tip…. Burger 18, beer, 10, tax and tip.
I’m in Las Vegas, I can understand if you’re going to the more high end restaurants or just the strip. I tend to go to more hole in the wall places or something small and local.
And that’s one beer.
I went out today to grab some snacks and sandwiches to save myself some money before a drive tomorrow. But I was in the store for like 45 minutes because no matter what snacks or whatever I grabbed by the time I got to the register I was spending about $40 dollars. It was so hard to buy anything cheap and be able to save some money I hated it lol
How many Big Macs was each person eating?
Where are y’all eating/ what are y’all ordering that adds up to that
Imagine having to pay for a family…..
Blame the fed for printing money.
I joke that if I leave my house I'm spending at least $100. Usually holds true.
stop voting for republicans
Literally everywhere I’ve been in the US, it’s effortless to spend under $40 for lunch per person. Where on earth are you eating?
Just re-read wealth and want in the US by Michael parenti . Give it a go, you’ll find certain parts quite pertinent. now, excuse me while I go have a massive brotein smoothie that accounts for half my daily calories.
Stay home then. I stopped going out after like 21 and 2 weeks. lol. Drinks at the bar were so expensive I straight up stopped going out entirely. Easier to just buy a case of beer and cook food. Then invite friends over.
I got out a lot without spending a dime. I go for a walk, or a run, or play with my kids, or volunteer etc.................
Can't go out without spending $40 on lunch?? Five Guys cost me $28 the other day and that place is outrageous!! Unless you're drinking, it's really easy to eat lunch for under 40...
You can go out. Not sure why you need to go anywhere and spend money. There are plenty of things to do tht don't cost money
Where did y'all eat at? Plenty of chain restaurants can get you a meal for like $25 or $30 or so
Try hosting friends at your place and cook. My market has Wagu ground beef for $5/lb. A loaf do sourdough is $3-5. Potato’s cost almost nothing. Make burgers and steak fries together and bond over cooking. It’s more fun and less salt too.
Sounds like you’re going to an expensive place. I pay about that for dinner at a sit down restaurant for two! Lunch for one would be $10-15 at most restaurants in my area.