Increase, increase, what about salary?

Yesterday I was eating my dinner when I received an SMS from a friend. The SMS says petrol will increase 10 cents and diesel 20 cents. My first reaction is that oh, quite small increase my car is a small car and nowadays I do not travel much on it. As my mind was flipping through the various scenarios, the impact of this increase could spiral into a bigger “increase” which eventually makes everything that we use increases.

For example, Transport Company will definitely increase its price. Taxis already increase theirs. All businesses that depend on transportation that uses petrol will follow and increase their price. Airlines, trains, cruise, buses and bla bla the list goes on. I guess our dear old newspaper might see a round of price increase. In fact come to think of it almost everything is dependent on petrol or diesel. That why some countries goes to war because of it.

Just imagine a product like rice, which probably harvest using machine that uses diesels. The pump that provides water to the rice fields also uses diesel. The rice will need to goes through numerous processes until it reaches the shops. Each and every process might be done by different individuals or companies that depend on diesel or petrol. If each of this process increases their fees, it means the rice which used to cost Rm30 will now become RM33 or so.

I used to eat nasi lemak bungkus at a cost of 50 cents per packet. It contains peanuts, Ikan bilis, a small piece of fried egg, sambal and of course rice. Now you will be lucky if you could get it for Rm1. I guess in years to come nasi lemak bungkus will increase its price to Rm1.50. What should we do?

Our expenses could be increasing proportionately. When consumer like us have our yearly salary increment (mine not yearly), we will definitely raise it up to our bosses. How many bosses are that kind hearted and understanding that they will increase our salary accordingly, raise their hands? Oh! I think I could only see one or two raising their hands up among thousands. I hope my boss is one of them….