Shoppers still punished by soaring prices as Joe Biden cheers latest inflation numbers
No, you’re not imagining it — the price of just about everything in your life is getting more expensive.
President Joe Biden this week spun the latest inflation numbers as good news for Bidenomics — cheering that October’s Consumer Price Index climbed a slightly less-than-expected 3.2% from last year.
But it’s cold comfort to consumers who are still getting socked by stratospheric prices for everything — from their groceries to the rent to the car they drive and the gas in its tank.
Indeed, compared to October 2020, when the US was under a COVID-induced lockdown, prices are up a blistering 18.2%.
According to data from the US Inflation Calculator, which tracks changes in the price of basic food staples based on the monthly CPI, the price of a dozen grade-A eggs rose a whopping 47% over the past three years, to $2.07 from $1.41.
Coffee was also among inflation’s most hopped-up pantry items, with a pound of ground beans surging to $6.18 on average, up from $4.52 in October 2020, the price-gathering service showed.
Other staples that rose roughly 33% from October 2020 to October 2023: White bread, which is up 50 cents to $2, as well as potato chips and chocolate chip cookies, both up over $1. The price of ground chuck, bacon, sirloin steak and chicken were also up more than 22%.
“I wouldn’t count on prices broadly declining,” Moody’s chief economist Mark Zandi told The Post when asked about the future of grocery prices.
High prices continue to squeeze consumers from all sides, including housing, where rent has surged more than 20% during the past three years.
According to apartment search engine Rent.com, the median monthly asking rent in the US last month was $2,011. In October 2020, it was $1,667.
Monthly mortgage payments also surged, according to American Community Survey data. which found that the average monthly mortgage payment in 2020 was $1,621.
The National Association of Realtors later reported that the average monthly mortgage payment on a single-family American home was $2,317 by the end of 2022, which marks a $696, or stunning 42.9%, increase.
The price of a new car has also been on the rise — up to $48,008 as of March of this year from 2020, when a new car averaged $41,152, according to data from personal finance site MoneyGeek.
To put gas in the car, drivers were shelling out an average of $3.35 a gallon as of Wednesday, according to AAA — roughly 36% more than the $2.14 average price-per-gallon back in October 2020.
“Primarily, the inflation we’ve suffered through is largely the fallout from the pandemic and the Russian war in Ukraine. As those shocks continue to fade into the rearview mirror, inflation will continue to come down,” according to Zandi.
Inflation’s rise has outpaced the 15.25% increase hourly wages in the same time period: In October 2020, average hourly earnings for all US employees was $29.50, versus last month, when hourly wages hit $34, according to federal data.
Though a slowdown in the pace of inflation hasn’t translated directly to lower costs in groceries, for example, Zandi predicted that “we’ll see significant moderations in [price] increases over the next six to 12 months.”
Meanwhile, President Joe Biden has been pushing his Bidenomics agenda that has consistently claimed to “reduce the [government’s] deficit” despite recently-released Treasury data showing the red ink has doubled over the past year, from about $1 trillion to $2 trillion (yes, with a “T”).
