Terry Bradburn, a 64-year-old widow, was No. 176 in line at Liberty Ministries Christian Fellowship's food pantry in Sacramento, Calif., on a recent Thursday, waiting for her allotment of salad mix, fresh pineapple, dried and canned beans, bagels and coffee cake.

A unanimous Supreme Court found this month that the government can withhold Social Security money to collect on old student loans. Much as this could impose a hardship on some retirees, the decision is just.

WASHINGTON - Consumer prices - stoked by more expensive energy and food products - registered their largest increase in more than three years last month, a strong sign that inflation is springing back to life.

WASHINGTON - The nation’s unquenchable thirst for gasoline — and finding an alternative to what’s been called our addiction to oil — has produced an unintended consequence: The cost of the foods that fuel our bodies has jumped.

Arizona shoppers are getting a bit of a financial reprieve as prices for meat took an unexpected -- and potentially unexplained -- drop during the first quarter of the year.

Trying to save money on food?

TUCSON - College students around the state will be paying hundreds — and in some cases, thousands — of dollars more to go to school this fall.

March 11, 2005

WASHINGTON - Consumer prices shot up in July, reflecting higher prices for gasoline and other energy products while output at the nations' factories, mines and utilities slowed sharply.

NEW YORK - Wall Street tumbled Wednesday as the price of a barrel of oil soared to a record near $124 and touched off concerns that the stock market’s recent gains might have been premature as consumers grapple with rising energy and food costs.

RICHMOND, Calif. -  Shoppers surveyed shelves loaded with rice at the Ranch 99 Asian supermarket, chatting in languages from Mandarin to Portuguese as they hunted for their favorite varieties, checked brand names and compared prices before heaving 50-pound bags into their carts.

NEW YORK - Wall Street managed a tiny gain Wednesday, enough to give the Dow Jones industrial average another record close, after the Federal Reserve stoked some fears of inflation pressures but implied that it's not intent on raising interest rates.

NEW YORK - Kosher meat, always more expensive than regular beef and poultry, may grow even pricier this summer after the arrests of nearly half the work force in an immigration raid at the nation’s largest kosher meat processor.

Deflation has finally come to the Arizona shopping cart. New figures from the Arizona Farm Bureau Federation find that, on average, the cost of food from grocery stores in the state is about 20 percent less than it was a year ago.

Got a freezer?

WASHINGTON - Propelled by sharply higher energy and food costs, wholesale prices soared by 1.7 percent in October, the largest increase since early 1990.

Americans will spend an average of 5.4 percent more on food and lodging for a vacation-packed summer than they spent last year, AAA Arizona said Monday.

Congress should slow down and give the ethanol boondoggle the skeptical scrutiny it deserves. Instead, it looks like the taxpayers will be saddled with another costly subsidy program under the guise of fictional energy independence.

Record-high gas prices won’t keep East Valley residents from kicking off summer with a Memorial Day weekend road trip. But fuel costs will change the way many of us take vacations this weekend — and all summer long.

NEW YORK - In a bid to pull hesitant shoppers into their stores, retailers are slashing prices on everything from jeans to dinnerware. But those fat discounts will likely come at a big cost for the companies.

Grocery prices in Maricopa and Pinal counties shot up more than 7 percent in 2007, according to a U.S. Department of Labor report released Wednesday.

WASHINGTON - It sounds hard to believe, but gasoline retailers’ profit margins are at a 20-year low.

Don't be surprised if you start thinking about gas while you're buying food.

Sticker shock is hitting some East Valley cafeterias, as high prices are forcing schools to rethink both their lunch prices and the food they serve.