Doesn’t My Stupid Ass Grandma Know About Inflation?

I love my Grandmother — truly I do. At 84 years old, she’s lived an impressive life. After becoming the first woman from her town to ever attend college, my Grandmother went on to a 55 year career in education. After a decades of teaching that saw her push to pilot a variety of new courses and programs, she was hired on as a Principal at the local middle school, where her attention to curricular detail helped secure some of the highest standardized test scores in the entire state. Such success eventually propelled her to the role of Superintendent of schools, where she was named state Superintendent of the year for 8 out of her 9 years in the position.

 

Upon her retirement, a gathering was held at the local football stadium as that was the only space big enough to hold the anticipated crowd. Speeches were given, tears were shed, and stories were told. And the one sentiment that came up time and time again was that “Dolores McGivern (Grandma) has got to be one of the smartest people I know.”

 

Well, I’m going to have to go ahead and disagree with that one.

 

Despite my Grandma’s success, everlasting legacy, and laundry list of accomplishments, her dumbass has been ignoring the fundamentals of economic inflation and giving me the same $20 dollar check for my birthday since I was six years old. And it’s time she got put on blast for it.

 

When I was young and those checks started rolling in, I was ecstatic. 20 bucks could get you a lot in 1996. In fact, I usually couldn’t even come up with a way to spend all of that money in a given year. So believe me when I tell you that I was incredibly appreciative of the money…at first. But as time passed and costs continued to go up, like a time capsule, that 20 dollar check remained exactly as is. And that’s where I really bristle with everyone’s assessment of my Grandmother. I know she has that statue of her out in front of high school and everything, but she doesn’t seem to understand how the economy works. I guess I always assumed that was one of the prerequisites of having a statue. I know that my Grandma helped thousands of children over her career in education, but her blatant disregard for the decreasing value of the USD, caused her to leave one child behind. Me.

 

Here’s what that $20 dollars should have looked with each passing birthday, had Grandma been a bit more fiscally aware:

 

1996: $20.00

 

2001: $22.56 

 

2006: $25.70 

 

2011: $28.67

2016: $30.59

 

2021: $34.80  

 

Pretty staggering numbers, wouldn’t you say? Look at all of the money that has been left on the table thanks to Grandma’s inability to do math. If the value of that birthday card money increased incrementally, as it should have, who’s to say that I wouldn’t end up a different and much more successful person? A person who doesn’t spend their money on Only Fans and gas station breakfast sandwiches. No one can be sure! Now, I’m not saying the money was owed to me, but I’m definitely implying that that money was owed to me.

 

Grandma, I love you and I do find you to be an incredibly honorable and decent person. I’ve always appreciated the messages that you put inside of the cards, telling me how proud you are of me and whatever my endeavor of the moment was. Be it competitive water-skiing, trying to start my own online university, or opening that 24 hour food truck, you’ve always believed in me. I only wish you had believed in, and understood, the basic principles of economic inflation as much.