Dirt cheap?

A recent article in the Washington Post has pointed out that the old expression 'dirt cheap' may not be particularly accurate these days, in America at least:

 

Even dirt isn't dirt-cheap anymore.  At your local garden center, the cheapest dirt, which often goes by the name of "premium topsoil," may cost $4.99 for a 40-pound bag, about a buck more than a year or two ago.  Dirt and its upmarket cousins offer a glimpse of how rising energy prices have caused inflation in the grittier corners of the consumer culture. Products that are cheap, heavy and bulky, such as bags of soil, are particularly vulnerable to rising freight costs.

 

Anyone else rushing to invest in dirt futures?

 

- Washington Post, 17 August 2008