A brass balance holds a loaf of bread in one pan and a faceted glass gem in the other against a green background.

Original artwork, not a still

Robert Orben

Inflation is bringing us true democracy. For the first time in history, luxuries and necessities are selling at the same price.

Behind the line

What it means

Our interpretation.

A sardonic joke about rising prices: when everything costs the same, luxuries and necessities are finally equal, and that gets called democracy. The humor is in treating unaffordable essentials as a leveling force, so a bleak economic complaint arrives dressed as good news.

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