Despite the recession, there are some things that people can’t seem to live without. So unless you’re filthy rich, you might want to check this list of outrageously overpriced products that we still continue to buy:
Movie Theater Popcorn. Grocery stores sell microwave popcorn at about $3 per box. Each box comes with 3.5 ounce bags. Movie theaters sell a single medium-sized bag of popcorn for $6. The average markup? A whopping 1275%!
Greeting Cards. Creating a home-made card will only cost you a few cents. And yet, people are still willing to pay an average cost of $2 to $4 for a greeting card. That’s a markup of between 100 to 200% for the fancy picture and the cleverly written message.
College Textbooks. Since 1986, the prices for college textbooks have skyrocketed to 186%. Books account for the 26% of the overall cost of college. Broke college students are required to purchase these costly books, hoping that, at the end of the semester, they can sell the books back to the local book store for a few bucks.
Bottled Water. In 2009, the U.S. Congress revealed that 45% of bottled water comes from municipal taps. Bottled water companies can choose to whether or not filter the water before selling it to you for $3 a bottle.
Printer Ink. Think about this: the Red Cross charges $200 for 500 ml of blood. That’s 40 cents per ml. A 42ml cartridge of blank printer ink is sold at $30. That’s 71 cents per ml. So over the life of your printer, you’ll be spending more than 500% of the total price of your printer for ink refills.
Brand-name Fashion. The mark up for branded clothes is at 500 to 1000%. Yet, some consumers still deny the fact that a pair of jeans from a budget store will work as fine as a pair from True Religion or Calvin Klein.
Source: Investopedia
How very true indeed the recession just makes things more expensive whilst most people are not even getting a pay rise