America's 1% Has Taken $50T From the Bottom 90%

Re:America's 1% Has Taken $50T From the Bottom 90% by SethMurphy on Thursday February 11, 2021 @08:34PM (#26109844)

Also, food is not included and is a significant portion of my perception of prices. Food prices went up significantly last year and it's not something you can decide not to buy.

It may be pandemic influence, but that's the world we live in now.

From USDA (source: https://www.ers.usda.gov/data-products/food-price-outlook/su...):

In 2020, food-at-home prices increased 3.5 percent and food-away-from-home prices increased 3.4 percent. The CPI for all food increased 3.4 percent over this same period. In general, food price inflation in 2020 was much higher than in 2018 (0.4 percent), 2019 (0.9 percent), and the 20-year average (2.0 percent).

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:America's 1% Has Taken $50T From the Bottom 90% by throwaway2037 on Friday February 12, 2021 @03:22AM (#26111678)

You wrote: "food is not included". The US Federal Reserve currently uses the personal consumption expenditures (PCE) price index. Read more here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Personal_consumption_expenditu...

The PCE fraction for "food and beverages" (home, away, alcohol) ranges from 13.8% to 17.0%.

That Wiki page also has a nice comparison to the consumer price index (CPI), which was previously used by the US Fed. US Social Security still uses CPI to adjust national pension payments.

Also, you wrote that food prices had more inflation in 2020 compared to other recent years. During the COVID-19 pandemic, many people had cheaper transportation costs, which would offset some or all of this food price inflation.

[ Parent | on HN ]