The biggest problem we have facing businesses like restaurants is probably the price of labor, and that is out of whack because you can't live on the wages that

The biggest problem we have facing businesses like restaurants is probably the price of labor, and that is out of whack because you can't live on the wages that restaurants can offer. A lot of that is likely due to things like health insurance, residential home prices and escalating college costs (which also lands on the price of eggs because the trucker who drives those to the supermarket needs health insurance as well). The restauranteur can't just raise prices and pay his workers more though because that "VAT" tax from stuff like health care is being taken out from every transaction in the economy. We're seeing the effects of the parasitism and rent seeking behavior where certain segments of the economy increase to squeeze and tax everyone else because their product is something nobody can do without. If it was just inflation that was happening, then everyone could raise prices and we'd eventually be back to normal (if the value if the dollar is sliced in half, but everyone doubles their prices and wages, nothing really changes). The secular problem we're seeing on the longer term (and the article addresses what has happened since he opened his business in 2001 so he's talking way beyond this latest spike) is more than just inflation.