Human brains are exquisitely evolved to detect patterns. Mine detected two items with a common theme, separated by only 70 years.
Item 1, from The Economist:
The Indian press is obsessively following the price of onions, which saw a massive spike at the end of last year and the beginning of this one. On Twitter, Indians have noted sarcastically that at one point last week, the prices of a kilo of onions, a litre of petrol and a bottle of beer (presumably in some places, since alcohol taxes vary a lot by state because of state-level taxes) were all the same. Onions get a lot of attention in India partly because many people believe (perhaps rightly, I can’t claim to be sure) that they’re one of the things that even the poorest Indians buy (along with rice or wheat, cooking oil and salt). There’s a stereotypical image of a very poor person in India subsisting on a couple of rotis, a pinch of salt, and some raw onions for flavour.
Item 2, from George Orwell’s diaries:
The onion shortage has made everyone intensely sensitive to the smell of onions. A quarter of an onion shredded into a stew seems exceedingly strong, E. the other day knew as soon as I kissed her that I had eaten onions some 6 hours earlier.
Even more spookily, Orwell immediately goes on to discuss the complex relationships, among price, quantity demanded, supply, and quality of goods.
An instance of the sort of racketeering that goes on when any article whose price is not controlled becomes scarce – the price of alarm clocks. The cheapest now obtainable are 15/- these the sort of rubbishy German-made clocks which used to sell for 3/6d. The little tin French ones which used to be 5/- are now 18/6d, and all others at corresponding prices.
By “racketeering,” does he mean to blame speculators? I certainly hope so.
