The price of oil and of all other government-subsidized commodities went up between five to nine percent today in what the Treasury said would be the last price hike “before Passover, and perhaps the last till Yom Haatzmout.” But the Histadrut branded the rise “unfair” since it came only a month before the Passover holiday.
The rise affected milk and milk products, bread and flour products, eggs, meat, chicken, gasoline, heating oil, food oil and oil-products. The rise in gasoline will automatically trigger a wider wave of price rises involving transport and haulage.
Industrialists told reporters today they would be unable to “absorb” the fuel hike, as the government urged, and would have to “pass it on” to the consumer.
Finance Minister Yoram Aridor told reporters he believes he is keeping inflation controlled (the most recent months figure was over five percent), and doomsday predictions of 200 and 300 percent annual inflation were proving completely unfounded.
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