In NJ you need to meet minimum earnings requirements. I have no idea what you're talking about regarding people who never worked getting UI benefits. Is that a covid exception ?

Meat supply is down because the packing industry is ravaged by COVID. They euthanized about a million hogs because of lack of capacity to process them.

But it's easier to blame the lazy brown meat workers on TV. People have a short attention span and pondering the supply chain is hard work.

HD isn't missing out on any profits. It's the guys who are trying to make a living using that lumber that are taking the hit. (see OP)

But yeah, some items are commodities and are directly priced as such. Most items aren't though. And if the price of pencils go up due to lumber they're not going back down when the lumber drops. That's just the way the system works.

When was the last time you, as a slum lord, lowered your rent because your material costs went down ?

I'd bet you raised it the max you could legally get away with and when the tenant complains you blame the guys in the maintenance shed.

Of course they go down. It's competiton that forces them down not some sort of good will.

Rents plumited in london during the lockdown.

Legally get away with? I can raise rents 10,000% if I wanted to, but obviously nobody would pay it.

As to the last time I lowered rents, that would be Wednesday of last week. It's crunch time and we have 5 units left to fill before winter. Those 5 units went on a fire sale of sorts. They'll fill this week because they're way under market now, and then when we send out renewals in spring, we'll send them for actual market rate. Those people are going to see a 15-20% increase in rent and maybe call me an *******, but in reality they just got a sweet discount because we didn't want an empty unit over winter.

The price of finished goods will absolutely fluctuate up and down based on material costs. If Joe's Pencil Shop stays at pandemic pricing forever, they're going to lose more and more business to Walmart, who uses algorithms for pricing. Then you have Amazon, which bases their entire business model on being the lowest price for everything at all times. Amazon has bots crawling the internet 24/7 and will constantly adjust pricing.

Price of 150 Amazon pencils:

Sure, but even if your customers keep buying from you in the immediate term, it doesn't mean that you can sustain the elevated rates indefinitely.

For example, when the rental market is tight in NYC, brokers can raise their fees with no meaningful reduction in customers. In other words, when the rental market is tight, demand for brokers is relatively inelastic.

But when the rental market relaxes, broker fees definitely go back down.

lol, that isn't how the "system works". You could be trolling or it could be some deep animosity for people with money but this is material that you should understand by now if you aren't. Its like the 3-6 limit players with 30 years of experience who still shout out that they aren't going to raise AK anymore because they never win with it. Of course Chezlaw will convey your points and half the others won't know who is right so it's a nice little system I guess.

Yes. Amazon has monopoly power. It offers goods at unsustainable low prices to kill competition. But over time those prices are going to rise, not fall.

You're making my point for me. Bait and switch isn't a commodity price, It's a way to sell your over priced product. God..you're awful. Just take your free money and stop whining that someone else who works for a living might make some money too.

Why do you believe that brown meat workers are lazy? I would like to encourage you to stop being a racist.

You mean those years I rented my landlord was lowering my rent and I only thought he was raising it the legal max (5% at the time, no limit now) ?

Look, I'm not complaining about that. It's what people were willing to pay and I paid it. I'm complaining about the the hand wringing when the same concept applies to actual human beings who work for a living.

Yes, rent/mortgage (biggest expense anyone has in life, most likely) is just like 3-6. Most people whine about getting their Aces cracked while losing their life savings via the rake.

No, of course not. But you (at least you should...if you're smart) make some vig in the process.

Are you being honest now ? Like Jesus would want ?

After you answer my question, I will answer your two questions.

Yes it is a Covid exception , the state along with the pandemic unemployment kicks in so minimum of 180+300 $ for someone that has never worked or paid taxes in their life
All is needed is a 2019 tax return claiming they were self employed which would be sent by mail and takes about 1 year to process these days because the IRS is understaffed so the states have no way of verifying that the person filing ever filed taxes in 2019
I have friends that did 100s of these applications at 300-500 a pop

Florida Probabaly has the best UI policy , they require everyone to submit resumes , a weekly proof that you have applied for a job etc.

In my opinion , NY along with other democratic states probably has the most lenient UI Rules going on which is borderline fraud

Owning property isn't free money. It's like working retail except every single customer is coming in with a complaint because otherwise they have no reason to talk to you.

RflushDiamonds comes across as someone who is clueless about how hard it is to be a landlord. Did you see how he referred to you in an earlier post as a slumlord?

Price of materials and supply is very volatile right now. Prices are going up and down every week.
Prepandemic levels we paid 45/50$ for a box of chicken in the last 3 months One week we paid 120$ , the next week was 81 , the following week was 100 etc… the argument that prices can’t go back down is invalid

The main concern is how long will this last ?

Supply shortages has almost nothing to do with people claiming unemployment and everything to do with our whole industrial process relying on just in time inventory management.

Because of several factors arising out of the pandemic, things have not been able to arrive just in time, truck drivers are off work, dock workers etc, which means the entire logistics system is in gridlock.

People not wanting to work has nothing to do with it.

That's how I know it's working.

Feel free to complain about what you want. You made a silly blanket statement that pencil prices wont drop when lumber prices fall. I mean, lumber could drop and pencil prices could soar - as well as any other possible outcome which you should know. You should also know which outcome is most likely to happen.

Why are rent prices so high?

Why are folks bidding good money to buy homes right now?

pretty sure inso isnt even a landlord. he just works for one.

its hard to do a lot of things but that doesnt mean its not an exploitive rent seeking endeavor. its one thing to rent out a room to get by. its another thing to profit of people at subsistence due to an artificially controlled market.

the fact is we have enough space and housing in this country that no one should really need to pay rent.

as for the landlords, I am not saying to put them on the street (altho I wouldnt be opposed to it for many of them.). rather they can learn to code or take on a second or third job.

Do you believe that grocery store owners are unfairly exploiting poor people?

Since you seem to care about poor people so much, how many homeless people are you letting stay for free with you in your house/apartment right now?

Okay. But labor force participation is a much better measure. The number of people working or looking for work is only 1% lower than pre-covid. That would be completely in line with what you expect after a recession and is much closer to a full labor force recovery than we ever got after 08. You have a bunch of people who didn't like the fact that unemployment insurance exists before blaming it for problems now that the data simply contradicts.

It was suppose to be the case as technology increased I suppose but the concept of privatizing profits and socializing loss still dominate.

So people gets poorer and poorer by losing their job to technology with nothing n return while corporations gets the reward .

I remember in the 80s , the story of early retirement at around 50 or working 3 days a week with lot of free time due to the increase of technological advancements lol …..

Well said.

I'm as much anti-Crony-Capitalism as I am anti-Socialism.

This is all-to-true in America: Socialism for the corporations and capitalism for the ordinary folks.

Sure, but some states that have the lowest rental rates also have the highest rental vacancy and the lowest demand. People are choosing the higher prices for other reasons and landlords are benefiting from those reasons in those areas.

Reducing Silicon Valley's rent prices down to West Virginia levels removes a lot of the "reasons" why folks decided to pay so much.