Food Inflation Might Cut Into Your Christmas Dinner
John Hugh DeMastri on December 24, 2022
Inflation continues to pinch consumers’ wallets, and heading into Christmas, food prices are running hot, with staples like eggs and flour up roughly 49% and 25% year-over-year through November, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS).
Overall, the cost of groceries was up 12% in November, compared to the same month last year, according to the BLS. Datasembly — a data analytics firm that maintains a weekly Grocery Price Index — estimates that a typical Christmas dinner, containing 13 items such as apple pie, ham and egg nog, cost 16.4% more than last year, with an average price of around $60.29, according to Fox News.
Leading the pack in Datasembly’s basket of products, the price of biscuits rose 47.7% year-over-year, while the price of frozen turkey grew the least at 6.3%, Fox reported. Other items on the list included stuffing mix, corn, green beans, butter, cranberry sauce, russet potatoes, whipped cream and gravy, which fell between the two extremes.
Compared to inflation across all sectors — which came in at 7.1% year-over-year in November — food prices have grown faster than the norm since March, according to archived BLS data. Food prices have been driven up in part due to lingering supply chain issues, weather, disease, and the Russian invasion of Ukraine, which have reduced the impact of the Federal Reserve’s ability to reduce demand and lower prices through interest rate hikes, CNN reported.
You and your family are likely cutting back this Christmas as inflation drives the price of everything higher. Shouldn’t Washington do the same?
— Kevin McCarthy (@GOPLeader) December 16, 2022
Unadjusted for inflation, consumer spending declined by 0.6% in November compared to October, but was up 6.5% compared to the same month last year, according to the Census Bureau. Adjusted for inflation, consumers spent 0.6% less on goods and 0.3% more on services in November compared to December, according to the Bureau of Economic Analysis.
Food Inflation Might Cut Into Your Christmas Dinner
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