I’ve been arguing for years that food isn’t as affected by inflation as it is the commodity market swing. I saw this poster on facebook this week and I think it proves my point:
For simplicity’s sake, let’s pretend inflation has driven everything 10x’s higher. By moving the decimal point on place to the right you would see that:
A new house = $119, 750
The average income = $46,500
A new car = $21,550
Rent = $950
Tuition to Harvard = $10,000 (Nope, it’s $43,938 source)
A movie ticket = $10
Gasoline = $2.40
Postage = $.40
These numbers are rough, but fairly close. (Except the tuition thing, and gasoline is a commodity so the fact that it worked in this formula is coincidence.)
But apply the same formula to food:
Sugar $8.90 for 10 lbs — um, no. It’s closer to $3
Vitamin D milk $10 a gallon — nope, $4
Coffee $9.30 a lb — We don’t drink coffee, so I’m not sure but amazon sells Folgers for $7 a lb
Bacon $6.20 a lb — nope, $3
Eggs $2.80 a dozen — sometimes, but they go on sale for $1
Hamburger $5.70 a lb — closer to $3
Fresh baked bread $1.90 — nope more like $5
Think about it. We have way more spending power when it comes to food, than our 1957 counterparts did. Then why were they able to easily maintain a single income family and still feed their families well?
I think it comes down to two things:
1. Thrift and home economics were valued by society. Think Leave it to Beaver. Today these qualities are portrayed negatively by mass media. And why not? The less thrifty they make us, the more money they can get from us.
2. They used more pure commodity ingredients such as eggs, milk and flour. With both spouses working and a plethora of kid actives, we tend to gravitate more towards pre-made ingredients and convenience foods just to survive.
What do you think?
I sure wonder where you shop to get those prices, even our Walmart prices are higher! Bacon & hamburger for 3.00 lb. a dream! Cheap hamburger, high fat is $5. lb!! Bacon is running 6.20 lb. Thank goodness I have my own eggs for I’ve never seen 1.00 a dozen in years! I really have to work and shop wisely on my grocery budget.
Hi Junebug, I mostly shop Aldi and Costco though I will occasionally go to a traditional store to grab a deal I saw in their ad.
I tend to think of food as more commodities driven than inflation driven too. This is interesting though because I often see food for close to the inflation price. Raw milk (I know not the norm) is $10/gallon, organic eggs are about $3/dozen. I have seen bacon as much as $6/lb. and I’ve seen cheap bread for $2/loaf. It seems like food in general has increased in price a lot over the last 5+ years. I’ve watched the same items creep up sometimes 30-50%. I definitely agree there is value in homemade, both financially and from a chemical-free stand. The price and quality of food is very very interesting and feels like it is constantly changing for the negative.
Let’s not forget how heavily subsidized the food prices are. I believe this is precisely to keep us from noticing inflation in the other areas. If food, required by everyone every day, is still relatively affordable then we won’t realize how little our dollar does elsewhere. So whether it’s through shopping our taxes, we’re still paying the inflated cost of food.
*shopping OR taxes
I think our dollars go less far because there are so many other things we are expected to buy these days that people did not have in the 1950’s: cell phones (multiple per family), Internet, computer, printer & ink, health insurance, multiple cars per family, satellite or cable TV, etc.