I’ve never understood the idiocy of people spending $5 for a cup of flavored water. I drink two or three cups of coffee per day, but I never buy it at Starbucks or any other retail outlet. I scoop some coffee into a filter and fill my coffee maker with water from the tap. My cup of coffee costs 10 cents and gives me the same caffeine surge as a pretentious overpriced Starbucks Triple, Venti, Half Sweet, Non-Fat, Caramel Macchiato or a Non-Fat Frappuccino With Extra Whipped Cream And Chocolate Sauce.

Walking around with a Starbucks cup in your hand is just another example of shallow math challenged people pathetically attempting to let others think they are successful and cool by flaunting that they can piss money away on flavored water with a fancy name. I guess it boosts their egos. Wasting money on such things is a reflection of a society of waste, egotism, shallowness, short range thinking, and ignorance. When you read the statistics about Boomer retirement savings averaging less than $50,000 and hear the sob stories about needing the government to support them, you just need a calculator and basic knowledge of math to see the impact of buying two Starbuck coffees per day versus saving that money. By brewing two cups at home versus buying two cups at Starbucks and investing the savings for 30 years with a 4% annual return, you end up with $50,000 to $100,000 of savings by retirement.

This is just one example of the frivolous expenditures made by the ignorant masses without thought for the long-term consequences. The chart below reveals a few more things to me. When the Fed is blowing bubbles and the people feel wealthy because their home price is rising or their stock portfolio is growing, the wealth effect convinces them to waste money on non-essential crap. You can see what happened to Starbucks when the financial system collapsed in 2009. Their sales went flat as they continued to add thousands of stores. Profits crashed and the CEO was shitcanned. They closed almost 400 stores as the reverse wealth effect convinced millions of morons to stop wasting money on overpriced flavored water.

But Bennie came to the rescue and began printing fiat at hyper-speed. The return of easy money, rising prices for McMansions, and expanding portfolios for the 1% have led to increased revenues and profits for Starbucks. The delusional masses never learn their lesson. I wonder how many frappuccinos they will be selling after the next financial collapse?