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+--- Thread: Most expensive groceries in the country... (/showthread.php?tid=23807)
RE: Most expensive groceries in the country... - HiloJulie - 01-28-2026
Hallucinating AI and hallucinating missing posts. What could be more Puna than that?
RE: Most expensive groceries in the country... - ironyak - 01-28-2026
lol - now she's busing to Hilo a couple times a week to buy in bulk 20 lbs of rice, 4 gallons (that's 34 lbs) of milk, etc, etc. and other cold stuff to take on the bus back to Puna... Right, sounds perfectly believable. $4 for a 20-slice loaf of bread (that's 20 cents a slice), but somehow 8 slices only cost 80 cents for Eggs and Toast? Or 4 cups of rice are needed for "Egg fried rice", but that costs nothing in that meal? And it's still "averaging $4.30 per person per meal", which is more than the Rollins $3 special, if any of the math is to believed (it's not).
I know believing made-up B.S. is part of your political preferences, but can't you spend 60 seconds to review the nonsense you keep posting? When people in Hawaii say they like spam, I don't think repeatedly posting this slop is what they have in mind.
RE: Most expensive groceries in the country... - HiloJulie - 01-28-2026
4 gallons (that's 34 lbs) of milk, etc, etc. and other cold stuff
How one gets 4 gallons of milk to last 1 month without it turning into god awful smelling very large curd cottage cheese, please advise!
RE: Most expensive groceries in the country... - Punatang - 01-28-2026
Well I guess AI is stupid. Odd no one pointed that out earlier in the thread when AI was cool. Back to national politics Punaweb. Aloha Nui.
RE: Most expensive groceries in the country... - leilanidude - 01-28-2026
now she's busing to Hilo a couple times a week to buy in bulk
-------------
Not busing, driving her car on her $48k per year job, with car insurance paid for, free housing and free electricity.
Don't forget when the annual Earned Income Credit gets her the big, beautiful bonus.
For the 2025 tax year (taxes filed in early 2026), a single mother with three or more qualifying children under 18 can expect a maximum combined federal and Hawaii Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC) of over $11,000. The EITC is a fully refundable credit, meaning it can be received even if no income tax is owed.
Seems that this momma is doing pretty well, considering.
$4k per month in income
$1700 per month in SNAP
No (or very minimal) housing costs
Car insurance paid
Reduced rate internet (about $10 a month)
$1k per month ($11k+ averaged from EIC
Free school breakfast and lunches for kids
Free bus transportation to school
Why wouldn't she be happy? Work more/earn more and possibly lose those benefits and the annual EIC payments? Heck, most workers in the US (and certainly teachers, right Ironyak?) don't get bonus cash payments like that.
RE: Most expensive groceries in the country... - HereOnThePrimalEdge - 01-28-2026
Heck, most workers in the US (and certainly teachers, right Ironyak?) don't get bonus cash payments like that.
Are we still pushing the updated local version of the Welfare Queen, who drove her brand new Cadillac through the ghetto? The Welfare Ali’i of Puna. EBT Card holders rolling in riches, buying lobster, caviar highest quality poi, and frozen Big Island Candies pies for $30 each at the KTA checkout. Dressed in resort wear they purchased at the King’s Shops in Waikoloa, coordinated with Niihau shell necklaces?
As usual, I must pick the wrong checkout line. When I get behind someone who uses their EBT Card, they’re wearing busted up rubbah slippahs and a faded t shirt.
And let’s not fail to mention Hawaii teachers making $100,000+ a year (yet school employee parking lots are filled with 10 year old Toyotas not BMW’s and Lexus.)
RE: Most expensive groceries in the country... - ironyak - 01-28-2026
Punatang - Well I guess AI is stupid. Odd no one pointed that out earlier in the thread when AI was cool.
Um, MyManao pointed out AI's limitations way back on page 2 - "ai doesn't have a lick of sense.. doesn't know right from wrong.. so maybe sprinkle a little salt on that."
In order to drive user engagement, "AI" chatbots are designed to be sycophantic yes-men that will happily tell you anything you want to hear and whether you are "discovering" new mathematics or making plans to kill yourself, they will cheer you on every step of the way. If you can't be bothered to cross check and verify their output, you really shouldn't be relying on them to do your thinking for you.
leilanidude - For the 2025 tax year (taxes filed in early 2026), a single mother with three or more qualifying children under 18 can expect a maximum combined federal and Hawaii Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC) of over $11,000
Not with a $48,000 income she can't. EITC is a graduated tax credit that maxes out at around $20000 of income - with $48000 income she'd get about $2800 in federal EITC, and Hawai'i EITC is like 40% of this I think (not a tax specialist), so it's like $4000 in total to offset any taxes/get a refund (go play with any EITC calculator to see this for yourself).
As the starting wages for teachers in Hawai'i are ~$50-60k, some of them probably qualify for some EITC depending on their number of dependents and marital status. Hopefully they make use of this tax credit as needed and get that "cash bonus" they are legally entitled to.
Regardless, you have no problem with any of this support for the hypothetical Hawai'i-single-mother-of-three right, because all of it is totally legal and none of it is fraud? It's tough to be working poor, especially in high cost of living places like Hawai'i, so no doubt you too are happy for those in need to get the assistance they're legally entitled to, right? Right... (I'd think with Reagan being dead as a doornail for decades the welfare queen myth would have met a similar end, but here you are still spouting talking points from the 70s and 80s... (ETA:Edge beat me to it by two minutes - that's what doing math instead of crafting quips gets you ;) Maybe leilanidude you can hire a Hawai'i teacher as a tutor to help bring you up to speed and dispel some of your misunderstandings - it would support local workers and you'd get actual human-tested and approved knowledge and insight instead of something AI made up to fluff your ego and confirm your priors :)
RE: Most expensive groceries in the country... - HereOnThePrimalEdge - 01-28-2026
doing math instead of crafting quips
Hey, you may not understand the full process, but I have to foam soy milk for my carefully calculated first cup of coffee too!
There was a tiny range within which coffee was effective, short of which it was useless, and beyond which, fatal.” —Annie Dillard.
RE: Most expensive groceries in the country... - HiloJulie - 01-28-2026
Taking HOTPE’s and Ironyak’s factually correct as well as humorous comments – and quips aside, if we take our pretend single mom of 3 kids, apparently living the pretend high life and in the lap of pretend luxury according to the Dude, and allowing for her pretend tax/food/housing et al allowances to her pretend 48K salary and then factor in the pretend lower unemployment rate, coupled with the pretend lower inflation rate, then we add in the pretend $2,000.00 tariff refund check, which, incidentally we pretend is paid by the Countries those tariffs are against, and then add in the whopping pretend $5,000.00 DOGE refund check, this pretend mom of 3 is rich, rich I tell you!!
No way does she deserve to get that pretend $3.00 per meal cookbook for free! NO WAY!
Now, leaving this pretend fantasy land, let’s see what happens to our pretend mom of 3 by the year 2033 IN REALITY - by all the provisions of that Big Beautiful Bill. (But by 2033, she probably has had 1 or 2 more kids by then since her older ones aged out)
Brookings Institute did a nice job summarizing it, even with fancy graphs and all.
I won’t even bore you with snippets or MY mostly boring quips; you can read it all here!
https://www.brookings.edu/articles/how-children-are-treated-in-the-one-big-beautiful-bill-act/
RE: Most expensive groceries in the country... - leilanidude - 01-28-2026
Teacher salary schedules are published as public information.
https://hawaiipublicschools.org/jobs/current-salary-schedules/
Individual pay for teachers used to be openly accessible but now has to be done via a FOI request.