San Francisco was HELLA EXPENSIVE in 1850, too!

My sister lent it to me ages ago, but today is the first time I picked up and began reading "THE BARBARY COAST," HERBERT ASBURY'S 1933 chronicle of the underworld of early SAN FRANCISCO, or as he describes it:
"The great mass of restless, turbulent, gold-hungry men who almost overnight had transformed the once-peaceful hamlet of San Francisco into a bawdy, bustling bedlam of mudholes and shanties."
Make that, "expensive shanties."
Asbury explains how the shortage of basic supplies and the abundance of gold nuggets created a unique inflation at the midpoint of the 19th century in the CITY BY THE BAY -- a small loaf of bread which would cost 4 cents in New York cost up to 75 cents in gold-rush San Francisco.
So, a day into reading Asbury's classic and I have already learned an important lesson.
San Francisco has *always* been expensive!