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The upcoming US Thanksgiving holiday, a time when family and friends typically celebrate with sideboards, a stuffed turkey, and low spirits, is set to cost about 20% more than last year, according to estimates compiled in an annual survey of grocery prices by the American Farm Bureau Federation.
Blame it on the weather, Russia's invasion of Ukraine, or
corporations' drive to maximize profits, all have a hand in driving up food
prices, but this year's jump is the biggest since the Farm Bureau's first
Thanksgiving dinner spending survey in 1986.
Coupled with last year's 14% increase, which was the
second-largest, the price of a "classic" meal of turkey, stuffing,
green peas, sweet potatoes, cranberries, rolls, and pumpkin pie for 10 people
has risen more than a third since 2020, at the outset of the worst U.S.
inflation surge in 40 years, from $46.90 to $64.05.
"That kind of increase we recognize is a burden on some families, no question about that," said Roger Cryan, the Farm Bureau's chief economist, though he noted that discounting as the holiday approaches may allow consumers to lower the bill.
U.S. consumer prices rose 7.7% on an annual basis in October
and had been increasing by as much as 9.1% earlier this year, triggering a
Federal Reserve effort to tame price pressures with aggressive interest rate
increases.
Food prices, particularly items bought for home consumption,
have risen even faster, hitting a 13.5% annual rate in August and still rising
12.4% annually last month, a shock to one part of the household budget where
prices had dependably increased less than incomes.
As food prices have risen, a U.S Census survey showed the
share of households reporting food scarcity rising from 7.8% in August 2021 to
11.4% as of early October.
"If you're in the grocery store right now, you see it,
in any grocery store you go to, people making tradeoffs," San Francisco
Fed President Mary Daly said last week. "How many people can they invite?
What are they going to serve? Are they going to trade down? Are we having a
different kind of meal? Are we not having as many options?"
Source:
Online/SZK
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