You’ve likely noticed just about everything is more expensive these days, but it could be worse. According to the Missouri Economic Research and Info Center, the most ex-pensive areas to live in were Hawaii, Alaska, the Northeast, and the West Coast. The least expensive areas were the Midwest and Southern states. The U.S. Bureau of La-bor Statistics reports increases in the indexes for food, new and used cars, trucks, fur-niture, and clothes. Over the last 12 months, the index for all items except food and en-ergy rose almost six and a half percent.