Yes, Thanksgiving Dinner Did Cost More

Biden claims this year’s Thanksgiving dinner was the 4^th cheapest ever. (It is maybe the 4^th cheapest of his 3-year presidency). But facts are hard things to deny, and we’re all facing facts every time we go to a grocery store.

Thanksgiving dinner tasted great, whatever it cost this year.

On his Wednesday night program, Glenn Beck said, “No matter how hard the government tries to gaslight, these things we know. We experience them every day.” 

Beck listed a number of items, and the percentages or amounts they have risen during the Biden presidency:

·        Airfare up 25%

·        House purchase price up 42%

·        Mortgage rates up 4%

·        Rent up 24%

·        Water up 16%

·        Electricity up 25%

·        Electricity in California up 51%

·        Major appliances up 12%

·        Natural gas up 29%

·        Used cars up 35%

·        Car insurance up 33%

·        Gasoline up from $1.80/gal to $3.00/gal

·        Big Mac combo meal $10.00

·        Restaurant food up 24%

·        Ground beef up $2.00

·        Coffee up $2.00

·        Fruits and Vegetables up 14%

·        Dog and cat food up 17%

He compared the weekly grocery bills:

·        2020 $238/week on groceries

·        2023 $315/week on groceries

So groceries overall are up 25%.

Glenn Beck went over some rising prices on his chalkboard,
November 29, 2023, screenshot from here
(also on YouTube here)

That seems to be about what I’m experiencing, but I wondered whether there was data beyond my gut feeling.

It so happened that last week, during the three days before Thanksgiving, without my usual assignments, I cleaned and cooked like crazy. I even took care of the jar where I stuff my grocery receipts (in case I need the receipts later). I hadn’t cleared that out in quite a while—it turned out, more than a year. I had thrown away some from time to time, but there were quite a few there. Since some of our trips to Sam’s Club this year surpassed $400, I wondered if I might see what really happened. So I organized the receipts by store and date and put them in a bag, to look at later.

When Glenn Beck talked about grocery prices rising on his Wednesday night show, I thought, what better time than now to go through those receipts. So I spent some time putting them on a chart and doing some math.

The way I shop is pretty regular—so regular that I have printed up grocery lists, arranged by how I walk through Kroger (weekly) and Sam’s Club (every other week), so I just have to highlight what I want that week, and check them off as I go through the store. In other words, I buy the same stuff over and over. I don’t buy vegetables that I let die in the fridge (except sometimes cilantro, which doesn’t last long, if I don’t get around to making pico de gallo). I eat vegetables regularly. We have a routine, and not a lot of waste. Our pantry is pretty well stocked, and so is our freezer.

The point is, I can compare many of the same items over time.

It also happened that I came across a couple of receipts, stuck behind some cookbooks, from February and March of 2020—just before the shutdown that so badly messed with a thriving economy. Those were shorter trips to Sam’s Club, with only a few items. But I can compare those to the same items today.

A few items have stayed essentially the same:

·        Almond milk up 0% from 2020

·        Canadian bacon up 0% from 2022

·        Sweet potatoes up 0% from 2022

·        Toilet paper up 0% from 2022

·        Mixed nuts up 2% from 2022

·        Romaine lettuce up 3% from 2022

·        Tomatoes down 2% from 2022

Vanilla went down, by 45% from 2020. We were, back then, dealing with a sharp rise in vanilla prices (related to a shortage I’m assuming) that has since subsided.

But many items went up significantly:

·        Avocadoes up 39% from 2020 (45 months: .87%/month)

·        Baby carrots up 46% from 2022 (12 months: 3.83%/month)

·        Frozen chicken tenderloins up 36% from early 2023 (10 months: 3.6%/month)

·        Clementines (small easy peel oranges) up 43% from 2020 (45 months: .96%/month)

·        Navel oranges up 35% from 2020 (45 months: .78%/month)

·        M&M peanuts up 46% from 2020 (45 months: 1.02%/month)

·        Raisins up 9% from 2020 (45 months: .2%/month)

·        Strawberries up 26% from 2020 (45 months: .58%/month)

I was trying to find a way to measure general prices. So I looked at the number of items and divided that into the cost for that shopping trip for an average price per item. I then divided these into manageable time periods and averaged the cost per item for those periods.

Sam’s Club cost per item:

·        Sam’s Club 2020: $7.32

·        Sam’s Club 2022: $9.03

·        Sam’s Club 2023 first half: $10.21

·        Sam’s Club 2023 second half: $10.59

Sam’s Club cost per item is up 45% from early 2020 (45 months: 1%/month).

Kroger cost per item:

·        Kroger 2023 first quarter: $3.98

·        Kroger 2023 second quarter: $4.31

·        Kroger 2023 third quarter: $4.63

·        Kroger 2023 fourth quarter: $4.61

Kroger cost per item is up 16% from the first quarter this year (8 months: 2%/month).

So, I’m convinced I haven’t been imagining it; prices are rising (while our income is not). I don’t know what Biden is imagining, but it isn’t related to hard reality.