Retail Food Price Inflation in 2020 Outpaced Historical Average by 75 Percent

Carolyn Chelius and Matthew MacLachlan

Amber Waves:The Economics of Food, Farming, Natural Resources, and Rural America, 2021, vol. 2020, issue 03

Abstract: The coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic had wide-ranging effects on U.S. consumers in 2020, including on the prices they encountered at the grocery store. Food-at-home price inflation was above average in 2020, primarily as a result of the pandemic. Grocery store food prices increased by 3.5 percent, on average, from 2019 to 2020. For context, the 20-year historical level of retail food price inflation is 2 percent per year—meaning the 2020 increase was 75 percent above average. This level of retail food price inflation was last realized in 2011, when poor weather, low commodity harvests, high fuel prices, and international trade disruptions increased global food prices.

Keywords: Consumer/Household Economics; Crop Production/Industries; Demand and Price Analysis; Financial Economics; Public Economics (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2021
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:ags:uersaw:310104

DOI: 10.22004/ag.econ.310104

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