Is it just me or has the U.S. begun to resemble the old East Germany?

Although I never visited that communist country, famous for its deprivations and authoritarian government,  I knew people who grew up there and learned about the hardships they endured.

East Germans experienced chronic and revolving shortages of almost everything, from toothpaste to bread. Shops were open a few hours a day and closed when the shelves became bare.

In our area, supermarkets are no longer open 24 hours a day. They began closing at 9 during the Covid shutdowns and stayed that way.

A shortage of workers, they say.

Shops everywhere - including at the malls - are opening later and closing earlier than they did a few years ago. Local restaurants shut down sporadically. All for a lack of wait staff.

If American grocery stores closed when they ran out of baby formula, many would be unable to open today. The nationwide shortage of formula, which began several months ago and has entered the critical stage, has left desperate mothers driving from store to store in search of something to feed their babies.

According to The New York Times, “Datasembly, a retail software company, said that about 31 percent of formula products were out of stock across the country as of April. In seven states — Connecticut, Delaware, Montana, New Jersey, Rhode Island, Texas and Washington — the rate for the week of April 3 was even worse, at 40 percent.

“The shortage is also financially burdening families already grappling with a surge in inflation. The office of the U.S. Surgeon General said on its website that families typically spend up to $1,500 on infant formula in the first year.”

Here’s a safe bet: Families will be spending a lot more than $1,500 on formula this year. Supply shortages, combined with astronomical diesel fuel costs will drive prices even higher.

Moms who need special formula for their babies have taken to Facebook and Twitter to swap information and in some cases, to buy formula for each other and ship it to areas that are hard hit.

When I checked my local Harris Teeter on Monday evening, there were only three cans of formula. Shelf after shelf was empty.

The baby formula problems began several months ago when Abbott had a massive formula recall due to suspected contamination.

That sent frightened mothers scurrying to hoard formula, which exacerbated the shortages.

When production is finally ramped up, formula is going to cost more. A lot more.

Even with President Biden busily depleting America’s strategic oil reserves by releasing one million barrels a day until the mid-term elections, gas prices continue to soar.

Especially diesel, which hit an all-time average high of $5.54 a gallon this week.

While diesel prices might not immediately alarm many consumers who rely on regular unleaded gasoline for routine transportation, tankers, trains, trucks, farming machinery and other industrial equipment rely on diesel, reports The Federalist.

“Diesel is the fuel that powers the economy,” Patrick De Haan, the chief petroleum analyst at GasBuddy, told CNBC. These increased costs are “certainly going to translate into more expensive goods.”

It’s not just baby formula, as most of us know.

New appliances, which once could be purchased and delivered the same day, now take months to arrive. Lumber is in short supply. And expensive.

When Pearle Vision at Hilltop phoned on a Wednesday a couple of weeks ago to tell me my prescription sunglasses were ready the manager reminded me that the store was now closed on Thursdays, so if I needed my glasses I should hurry in that day.

Huh? Retail stores closing mid-week? When did that begin?

Perhaps we were simply spoiled, living in the land of plenty with good service, affordable gas and 24-hour shopping. Your refrigerator could break one day and you’d have a new one the next.

No more.

We now live in a country with chronic shortages, rampaging inflation and politicians gaslighting us, trying to blame the mess on Russia.

Just wait till the recession arrives later this year.

If the Biden administration can’t turn this around, voters in 2024 will elect a president who can.

Someone needs to remind the White House that East Germany was a cautionary tale. Not a model.