Tuesday, August 28, 2007
Cost of Stuff
I recently had to buy a new battery for one of our car remotes. It's a pretty typical battery, a 2016 button cell. I can't quite figure out why there's such a range of prices for the exact same item.
Except for the privately labeled Radio Shack battery, they are all the same brand. I wouldn't be surprised if under the Radio Shack label, the battery is the same either. I ended up buying them at Target along with a bottle of Target branded aspirin - which was cheaper than the national brand version unlike the battery prices at Radio Shack.
Which also brings to mind gas price changes. This seems to be the only commodity sold to the general public where the price changes almost hourly. I can't figure out why the gas I bought yesterday at $2.899 suddenly goes up to $.3069 today. And why the 9/10 of a cent that gasoline is sold by? Back when it was $0.329 a gallon, the sneaky 9/10 of a cent was a fairly significant "hidden" addition to the total cost of a gallon of gas. Now when it's $3.299 a gallon, the 9/10 of a cent is just annoying.
I can't but wonder how long before everything else changes price like gasoline does. You could buy a Big Mac yesterday at $2.10 but tomorrow, it will cost you $2.25, and two days later be back down to $2.07 and 9/10 of a cent.
