Welcome to Money As If, a vanilla dark chocolate Häagen-Dazs bar your dad bought you home from QuickChek circa 1995. Today's pops:

— Jeanine

P.S. Liking Money As If? Share that referral link below!

Last week, I had a craving for a Häagen-Dazs bar, a treat I have weirdly fond memories of from when I was a kid. The ice cream was decadent, and the thick chocolate shell always made a satisfying crack on first bite.

But upon eating one, I found myself decidedly disappointed. The pop itself was much, much smaller than I remembered, the ice cream was thin, and so was the shell, which disintegrated into at least 13 pieces the second my teeth touched it.

Häagen-Dazs bars aren't particularly expensive. You can get a three-pack for somewhere between $2 and $6, depending on where you shop and whether there's a sale. And yet, my very first thought while cleaning chocolate pieces off the floor was: I will never, ever buy these again.

I'm not naturally frugal. I'm naturally debt-averse, which has reliably curbed my larger spending impulses, but I’ve long considered it a financial goal to manage my money well enough that I don't have to always count dollars and cents. (A privileged goal to be sure, but not one achieved wholly without effort.)

Lately, though, I've been thinking (a lot) about tipping points. Living through a period of sustained inflation and an increasingly shaky job market will do that, I suppose.

There are … let's call them "tolerable" explanations for why inflation persists post-pandemic. Tariffs are making imports more expensive, and businesses are passing those costs on to consumers. Higher-income households are still spending, so retailers aren't under pressure to lower prices because demand is weak. Numerous old and new supply chain issues remain unresolved.

And then there's the possibility that many businesses are raising prices simply because they can. The "right" customers, after all, will accept — and eat — the increase.

I call that a possibility because some businesses have hinted as much. Just last week, leaked audio from a Chipotle earnings call suggested a price hike was forthcoming, but nothing to sweat, given that 60% of its guests earn over $100,000 a year.

The fast food chain, which raised prices by 2% in Dec. 2024, has since sought to clarify its CEO Scott Boatwright's comments. But recent earnings calls from Delta, United Airlines, and Walmart have echoed similar sentiments.

That price increases appear to be happening in tandem with measured quality dips adds a special insult to injury.

British journalist Cory Doctorow coined the term "enshittification" to describe the decay of digital products, like social media platforms and online marketplaces. His theory goes like this:

I'm not the first person to flag this, but it sure seems like the term (and the process it describes) applies to very many modern-day goods or services, from airline seats and burritos (possibly smaller, if TikTok is to be believed) to the chocolate your child has to sell for school fundraisers (do you remember when these cost a $1, but were double the size?) and Häagen-Dazs bars.

Thanks to the one-two punch of inflation and enshittification, I've found myself becoming increasingly savage about purchases — large and small — in recent months. That's included coming up with new rules for myself around tipping points, which, so far, has worked out something like this.

I’ll admit: I was hesitant to write about this. I've long refused to preach "thrift" because I hate the go-to framing — namely, that it's our personal responsibility to suffer for our money, and if we're not suffering for our money or, at the very least willing, to suffer for our money, we're doing something wrong — and I was hoping to de-normalize it. (Money As If, after all, was initially conceived as a safe space to indulge your $7 latte habit.)

But I've come around to budget-savagery (and to advocating for it), upon realizing it could be leveraged to punish and (🤞) influence providers or enshitti-fied products and services, and not, you know, myself.

I might not make enough money right now to influence the price of Birkin bags or houses, but perhaps my more stringent small-dollar spending habits can help spare us from $100 burritos.

Nowadays, most financial takes are boilerplate. These aren't.

And, finally, today, in things I would buy if, you know, I could just buy things …

So I originally blocked off this section to groan about how this year's Super Bowl ads confirmed that our economy is pretty much powered by robots, crypto, weight-loss drugs, and gambling, but then I couldn't decide what to complain about most.

Kendall Jenner pretending she made her fortune sports-betting against her famous athlete exes (and not, you know, nepotism modeling)? No less than 6 celebrities trying to sell me Wegovy in a single spot? Whatever the hell Anthropic was doing — is it supposed to make me like the AI?

Plus, I feel like I've been doing too much groaning lately anyway, so how about we all just gawk at this gorgeous dress I can't afford?

Got questions, comments, receipts, tips, thirst traps, etc. you’d like to share? Send them to [email protected].

_{This article is for educational purposes only. We don’t recommend or advise individuals to buy, not buy, sell, or not sell particular investments or other assets, as everyone’s circumstances are different. Also, it’s your money and ultimately up to you to decide the best use for it.}