Grocery Inflation is Low, but Why Do Consumers Feel It Is High?

Ashley Jiyoon Kim and Sungeun Yoon

Choices: The Magazine of Food, Farm, and Resource Issues, 2025, vol. 40, issue 1

Abstract: In the United States, the inflation rate hovered around 2% for decades, aligning with the Federal Reserve’s target for a stable economy (US BLS, 2024). However, the disruptions in both demand and supply chains from the COVID-19 pandemic and the Russia–Ukraine conflict led to high levels of inflation, from 4.1% to 9.1%, between April 2021 and May 2023. As shown in Figure 1, food prices were more unstable; for that reason, they are excluded from core inflation calculations (along with energy prices). Specifically, the price index of food at home (FAH) is more volatile compared to that of food away from home (FAFH) and of all items. FAH inflation was minimal and stable at less than or around 1% before experiencing moderate to high fluctuations in 2020 and 2023, peaking at 13.5%.

Keywords: Agribusiness; Agricultural Finance; Demand and Price Analysis; Supply Chain (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2025
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://ageconsearch.umn.edu/record/350110/files/G ... ation%20is%20Low.pdf (application/pdf)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:ags:aaeach:350110

DOI: 10.22004/ag.econ.350110

Access Statistics for this article

More articles in Choices: The Magazine of Food, Farm, and Resource Issues from Agricultural and Applied Economics Association Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by AgEcon Search ().