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I disagree Evan inflation rates are more complex than that, left wing always blame brexit, what about the Ukraine war, energy going up as a result which impacts costs hugely on food. I love your videos, but sorry I have to disagree strongly on this one.
@@jasmineteehee3612 Considering that this was a comparison between US and UK prices, and both are subject to the impacts of the Ukraine war, it's reasonable to assume that the difference between the two must be at least in part due to something(s) that has only impacted onto one of these two countries, like for example abandoning barrier free trade with the trading block from which we buy around a third of our food, the EU. "LONDON, May 25 (Reuters) - Britain's departure from the European Union has accounted for about a third of the increase in food bills for households since 2019, equivalent to about 250 pounds ($316), researchers from the London School of Economics and other universities said."
The U.S. economy has been much stronger and robust than the UK economy for years no matter how you look at it (before Brexit and after Brexit). If you look at the inflation rates, the U.S. is 3.67% and the U.K. is 6.7%!… Yeah, that’s almost half in the USA!
@@jasmineteehee3612What do you think is causing the specific difference between the US and the UK? Both have been impacted by the same global issues (Ukraine, energy prices), so what's the difference? Why is the UK economy doing so much worse?
As a uni student in the UK, this stuff really stands out to me. I'm already living with a razor thin budget each week, so when basics like meat and cheese skyrocket in price, it starts eating into money I don't have.
When I was a University student (it was long ago, I am 77 y/o) and felt I needed to economise, I gave up both meat and store-bought bread. But one needs to pay attention to nutrition. Allow me to suggest the cookboook "Diet For a Small Planet."
@@conormurphy4328 no I mean what I said: interesting to see over several years the differences. Even if things are harder it is still interesting to see the differences. The differences in how interest rates rise and/or fall each year, the difference between UK and America each year, how much things go up each year. It might be disturbing but it is also interesting because it gives people a better perspective of things.
I'd expect to see the UK get cheaper again. Some foods are already dropping back down in price as cost pressures ease, and the healthy competition between supermarkets will ensure those cost decreases are quickly fed back to the customer.
I am an unemployed single adult living in Scotland. - The differences in prices over the last three years (?), mean I spend a lot longer time in each supermarket trying to find the cheapest decent substitute for every item, and often just don't get them at all. It hurts to see a bag of food items that used to cost me £ 20 ish now is smaller and costs £ 35 ish.Ouch.
When I was at uni, I was surrounded by a number of supermarkets. So I used a couple of price comparison apps “trolley” and “Latest deals” and they must have saved me hundreds.
You'll then have flexibility to shop at at times when they the yellow stickers, like I do. Up to 65% off in Tesco on Sunday and over 50% at M&S after 16.30 everyday.
I have found it's cheaper to shop online. I used to shop in Aldi would spend around 80 me Mrs and 4 kids. Now I'm spending about £90 with Sainsbury's. I went into Aldi recently and ended up spending well over £100 so I find online is better as you don't end up picking up random crap.
@@anthonyferris8912 Tesco has 3 times in the day where they reduce some items. 4pm and 8pm are the main ones but I think the third is 6 or 7pm on meats.
When I moved from the Netherlands to Canada in March I couldn't believe how expensive groceries were. My typical grocery run which cost €30 in NL cost $90 in Canada (about €60). And prior to the Ukraine invasion my grocery run had been €20 in NL. Thankfully prices in Canada have actually dropped since then and my typical grocery bill is now around $70. I'm not sure what the change has been in NL during that time
Groceries in Canada have been insane for a long time (when I was in the US in 2003 Canada was cheap for groceries, but when I lived in Canada in 2010 it was crazy expensive) but I did find that my Canadian wage made it pretty affordable. Food inflation is running about 10% in the Netherlands still, so it's rough but slightly better than the UK.
@@foxy3711 in both cases just going to a midrange neighbourhood supermarket. There's not much price variation between supermarkets in Canada (within a given area)
Before 9/11 when travel between the US and Canada was super easy, a lot of Canadians would travel south to do their shopping south of the border once a week.
I think it's also important to mention that the average salaries in each country are different - in the USA it sits just under $60k (roughly £48k) whereas in the UK it is around £32k (roughly $39k).
It depends if you’re using mean or median averages. This could mean a near $15,000 difference in the US. This brings our average to median to pretty similar amounts. $47,000 in the UK vs $48,000 in the US. The US mean would be considerably higher because mean is more sensitive to extremities and the US has a much higher number of extremely wealthy individuals.
Growth in annual wages since 2010 is one of the worst in the developed world too. 0.1%, whereas the US 17%. Our government have failed us and this is solely due to us bending over for uncle Sam!
I know that this is insane for the UK, but as a US student who had to buy groceries for the first time when I studies abroad in Liverpool, coming back to the US and buying groceries there was a terrible wake-up call
The ones I feel sorry for are all the Support workers. When I worked in the NHS briefly and it was very brief due to the blame culture and sheer laziness of some staff, I found I was being used to do so many different things as a support worker while the nurses spent their time doing paper work 🙄. When I started the job I was expected to know everything even though I'd never worked in a clinic before. Once I realised I was doing 100 different things that nurses were asking me to do while they stood around chatting I thought 'Sod this for a game of laughs I'm off'. They were shocked when I said 'Thanks very much here's my notice and it's because I'm here to be a support worker not a general dogs body thanks'. I went back into being a night care assistant at a nursing home and I much preferred that as I was part of a team. So it's the support workers that should get a huge pay rise and the clapping and the nurses are important as they do so much but do transfer a lot onto support workers too.
One thing I’ve found out about grocery costs in the US these days is that prices at the same chain can vary a lot by neighborhood. A US gallon of milk (4ish liters, not the same as a UK gallon) is a dollar or more cheaper at one grocery store vs the same brand at the same chain ten miles away.
@@beckypetersen2680 That's nice. A lot of us do have kids, though. Obviously I buy milk as I brought it up. Also, it's an easy metric for how costs for the same item vary widely based on a short distance. The point wasn't the milk other than as an example, it was that prices on the same goods can vary a lot even on very short distances and even when coming from the same store and distributor. But okay, cool. Eggs are also a big cost difference. Breakfast cereal cost difference varies, but it's almost always more expensive in the suburbs - even the poor ones - than the city. Produce prices vary a lot by season so I don't have a good feeling for how much those prices are different between stores. Meat tends to be pretty similar in prices.
Definitely. I live in a fairly low income neighborhood and I get most of my groceries at Kroger. The rich neighborhood a couple of miles away also has a kroger, but they are almost 25% more expensive, just because they can be. It's all the same goods. Also I'm an adult with no kids and I go through about a gallon of milk per week.
As well as tea, most adults (>80% per market research) eat cereal, and 30% of us eat it daily, it's by far the most common form of breakfast here and save for the veggies, everyone has it with milk.
I think a huge contributing factor at Tesco and Sainsbury's has been the rise in Clubcard and Nectar prices. I completely get why you didn't include this in your comparison, but it has been a massive scam that has driven up RRPs. Clubcard prices aren't actually much better than the regular price at other supermarkets, if at all, but the RRPs are ridiculously high so that we feel that we're making a saving. Clubcard prices are now the old regular prices, for most items. When there is a genuine manufacturer offer, at Tesco and Sainsbury's it's locked behind a "give-us-all-your-personal-details" wall, whereas at places like ASDA it's accessible to all customers. I'd be interested to see what this inflation comparison is like at supermarkets such as ASDA, Aldi or Lidl, as they don't have the same sorts of marketing ploys.
I personally would like to see this taking into account Clubcard prices; A. To show how much money a clubcard "saves" you, and B. Literally everyone uses a clubcard now so it's not representing the prices most people pay. I can completely understand why the clubcard prices weren't taken into account though.
The US stores do the same thing. If you use the club card and only buy staples that will keep when on the rotating sale; the prices are normally 50-33% lower if not more. If ACME works like Safeway and Albertsons they have digital coupons too. When that started they jacked all the prices up so the digital coupon club price is similar to the old price.
@@lee53_ Maybe I'm just stubborn, but I absolutely refuse to use a club/nectar card. It's known that the supermarkets use these to collect huge amounts of extremely valuable and private data about you and sell it to whoever wants to pay. I kinda wish more people saw it for what it is and started calling the big chains out for it.
@@zanzabar4ky7This! Hannaford/ Food Lion (any other chain the big company may have) + places like Kroger have their own membership cards and sometimes their sales with membership still leave certain foods pricier than somewhere else. Can be managed if you happen to live close to multiple places on a budget to adjust how you shop but for those who can’t travel much or have access they have to pay the extra
I'm a student so just shop for myself and this time last year I was paying like £10-£12 for a decent part of my weekly shopping besides the random things I grabbed in the week. This year I'm paying like almost £18-£20 for the same bulk of my shop. Then when I grab things in the week it's definitely also more expensive. I'm fortunate to be quite financially safe for a student but I can see how it affects other people around me.
It’s also more costly to buy just for yourself. I ended up freezing everything to make it last long enough to consume it, like broccoli especially. Fortunately, even though Wilko’s is gone now, they built a Lidl right next to my old uni a couple years ago, so most of the students are okay. But then students at my old uni are generally better off because those are typically the sort to go there. If it was my local university, then I know a lot of students there struggle. All my loan went on rent and bills, plus about £300 of my wages during second year, but fortunately my job paid well enough that I could handle the food bill on 8hrs a week. But I think I would not have lasted if I had to work longer to pay for food inflation. My course was tough enough as it was. I found a cheaper place over the pandemic, but still didn’t have much spare change until I went back home to take a break after the course ended and to earn money to drive. Problem is that at the rate things are going, the price of lessons etc. will have doubled by the time I reach the current amount I need. 🙄 Brexit and Truss have murdered the country’s economy compared to what it was. I’m sure most voters did not even bother to pick up a GCSE textbook to learn about what they were actually voting on. Never mind that we used to have one of the most privileged positions in the EU, and had enough backing to actually talk about international issues. Now we’re just the laughing stock of Europe. I’d argue that only America is worse out of the developed countries, but only because women are losing their rights and their politics is only a bit worse than ours. But at least they have enough power to back themselves up, even without being part of a trade bloc.
Yea, the global pandemic, lockdown and central banks pumping trillions into a frozen economy has caused huge price spikes around the globe, but the UK was uniquely different, it was Brexit.😂😅
@@anthonyferris8912 Compounding factors. UK is worse off because it is all of Brexit, the war in Ukraine and the pandemic. While the rest of the world "only" has to contend with the war and the pandemic.
@@57thorns Except that the UK has a small growth in economy but EU countries like Germany etc. are in negative or stagnant growth. So Brexit's impact is now negligible.
ive found that aldi/lidl have become proportionately more expensive than the big super markets, ie, that whilst the prices at all have gone up, the differential between aldi and sainsburys for example have got smaller. So ive actually found aldi less attractive because of general price rises, which is kind of ironic/unexpected.
My wife and I just moved the the UK for postgrad programs and we were so surprised at how much cheaper food (and particularly produce) is compared to the US. Of course, five mins of job hunting on Indeed shows how low the wages are relative to the US as well though 😆😭 thanks for the follow-up vid Evan! You’ve been super helpful in the transition of moving to the UK ❤
What jobs are you looking at?. It's all relative. If i moved to America, i would get paid double, but through costs and taxes and insurance, i would end up with less and a poorer quality of life. That and the x100 likelihood of becoming a victim of violent crime. Anyway, what jobs are you looking at? I might be able to help. Looking online isn't always the way to go.
Uk here, i have had to start making everything from scratch, bread, pasta, sauces etc i also started buying from the reduced section and freezing it. Im still paying double what i used to in groceries, but my new way of doing things is definitely helping me put a bit more money towards heating or electric or diesel, which has also increased :(
I used to shop predominately in Lidl but it closed down in the city I live in. I moved onto Aldi and Asda but all my shopping is just getting more and more expensive. I slowly start buying less and thinking of cheaper meals to cook because it is not sustainable to keep spending more for the same amount of food when my paycheck does not change at all.
Except inflation is due to the pandemic, loads of countries across the globe have had record inflation including the USA, how is that linked to Brexit?
@@orwellboy1958 because all countries had the pandemic, all countries are affected by the war in Ukraine, yet the UK is the only country whose growth is similar to Russia's (which is to say terrible, and embarrassing seeing as Russia has global trade sanctions). Hmmm. What unique circumstance has Britain gone through that would affect it that way?
@@orwellboy1958If only a group of people who advocated against it advised that there would be negative consequences, but that would just be projecting fear, wouldn’t it?
@@hughtube5154 growth simalar to Russia? Someone's been listening to the MSM. Inflation in the UK is very high, I admit but to only blame Brexit is very blinkered. Evan is not taking into account other factors like house prices and fuel prices in the USA which have been and maybe still are at record highs not to mention lumber which is not such a big deal here but in the USA definitely is.
For your Germany vids, i'd love to hear from people who've moved from places like the US, UK, Scandinavia etc into Germany and their experiences adjusting. I think it's always fascinating seeing the cultural differences between cultures you'd assume are quite similar (Like the UK and Germany for instance)
I’m thinking of moving from Shetland, maybe to Germany but in Transylvania I grew up surrounded by Transylvanian Saxon culture so it wouldn’t be a shock. Do you watch Uyen? The Vietnamese lady who moved to Germany to be with her bf. She’s very funny 😄
All I can say is that "mid-range" has been out of my range for a long time. I've had to shop at Walmart, like most people in my area, and Walmart's prices are about 50% more than they were a couple of years ago.
I've been straight up begging Americans to look at how hard inflation has been hitting us in the UK, because a lot of them are talking about inflation as a reason to ditch Biden and it's like... you have no idea how much worse it'll get.
We should also be talking about running out the corporations on a rail as they are the driver of inflation. There are no government petrol stations or supermarkets.
It's how the traditional media siloes things. We're not told in America, except if you find the right TH-camr, that we have the least inflation of any big developed country, because financial and international news are two completely separate beats.
Just to offer another perspective outside of supermarkets, I work in a local village shop where clubcards and memberships obviously aren't a thing anyone needs to worry about. Every week when new stock comes in and i update the prices on our system, well over 60% of items have increased in RRP. i'd actually guess near 80% but seems safer to lowball it. Its worth noting that we will sell some items slower, so more time will pass between when they're ordered and updated, (it's not like everything is increasing every week,) but still, I've seen some massive increases in price because of it. Our country got some real problems right now.
A lot of the fresh produce is shipped overseas, particularly to China (17% back in 2017). That year, about 20% of US fresh produce was exported. I don't know what it is today. In 2022, China for the 2nd year in a row was the largest importer of US fresh produce. I can't find the current percentage though. The USA imports about 15% of its food according to a March 2023 comment made by the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA). These figures lead me to believe that it is being kept artificially high.
US agriculture is mostly huge industrial farms, so potatoes mostly come from Idaho, apples from Washington, corn from the Midwest, oranges from Florida, etc. Most stuff won't be grown locally, wherever you are.
@@kadams3029 Most oranges I've seen have "South Africa" labels or "Africa" labels and say packaged in California. The "halos" mandarin oranges I just bought at the store say "Product of South Africa" and "Packed by Wonderful Citrus Packing, Delano, CA 93215". Even though Florida is only a couple of States away from me. Most of the vegetables I buy from the store are from South of the Border. Very little fresh produce from here in the States seems to make it to my store.
I’m in the U.K. and I do a weekly online shopping for a family of 5. Every week I need to calm myself down as I get so angry about the prices. I can feel the anger growing as the price rises on my online basket. We used to be able to go to other shops and find alternatives or buy the same item cheaper somewhere else. But now prices are very static and it’s difficult to find bargains to feed the family, and I am a quite savvy shopper and cook. I keep putting things that I need in the basket, just to remove it, then I have to chose which ones we can’t live with for the week. It’s infuriating! One family member works in a supermarket that has shown that they have made so much profit that’s insane. This is probably why I feel angry and take myself on a time out every time I do the family shopping.
There's definitely unnecessary profiteering going on, they did the same thing in the pandemic, it shouldn't be allowed, people are already struggling because of inflation, then their greed ads on unnecessary higher prices which is criminal!
I think that I should add that in the case of the UK there have been external factors that have added in an additional kick in inflation in some categories. Cereal/grain product prices are still being massively affected by the Ukrainian war as well as weather that led to a reduction in supply, something that the US wasn't affected by. Canned tomatoes were clobbered by last year's European heatwave, leading to a massive shortfall in production compared to normal years, and is expected to fall back closer to the real inflation rate as this season's crop starts hitting the shelves. However, it is also clear that there is a definite chunk of inflation caused by the UK government's policies (or lack thereof) on food supply that has not been experienced by the rest of Europe.
The only caveat I'd put for sales prices is that Sainsburys and Tesco have gone a bit mad with their member only pricing, they're not really sales a lot of the time as using the card just means that you're paying the normal price everywhere else. I've been seeing many cases of products being cheaper at Waitrose than the non-Nectar/Clubcard price.
Welcome the the usa side of the world who have been dealing with this robbery since 2021. Almost entirely when the Usa left Billions in Afghanistan and also tried to make workers in the usa dragged down the price of the wages they expected worthlessness by driving up inflation. See what happened in the mediaeval peasants who asked for higher wages as a way of getting over their ‘betters’ as all going through world wide! This is planned, and absolutely a way for those earning‘better’ after covid shutdown reshuffling of jobs to go back in their places. Yet we resist! Now, we have ro go back to unions to survive instead of being drawn into poverty. This is a fundamental war against those who would exploit us vs. those whom have everything, but won’t pay. This is a war against the haves vrs the have nots, and we need to take out the Prince Charles’s and the political overlords in order to survive. We can NOT WHAT HAPPENED WITH Edward the 3rd to talk us down. We must DEVOUR THEM ALL!
And I still vote for a god damned purge, as those in charge will die the most, despite the war parades of the USA armed forces, as those who serve ARE OVERWHELMINGLY IN POVERTY, and are not let out of poverty by joining, nor their aftercare satisfactory. We are a country ready to revolt. I hope you all in other countries fill your ranks with these who will get you weapons, as they help a WHOLE LOT. At the bargaining table. NEVER TRUST FOREIGN POWERS, and ALWAYS TRUST YOUR GUNS AND anti military WEPONS! History doesn’t need to be REPRODUCED!
Fuck the loyalty card/member card price bollocks. Just another way to screw over anyone who doesn't have a card or forgets to take it, which given the sheer number of them these days, is easy to do.
I have a weekly delivery of groceries and I have certainly noticed the increase in one simple way. To get free delivery, I need to spend £40, a year or so ago, I used to end up adding cleaning or other non perishable items most weeks to get over the threshold. Now I just add the basics and it is over the limit already!
I think if you're going to compare items it's usually a good idea to give a range of prices, so rather than 1 loaf of bread about the middle of the price range you instead do 4 or 5 loafs across the spectrum. This then gives a really good idea of how it affects the pricing as a whole. Obviously not a thing you can do when you only have one price to compare too,but just an idea if this is going to be a regular thing.
As an American who has always shopped at Walmart (I’m a poor student lol), I’ve noticed that the prices have gone up significantly more in the past year than they appear in this video. My guess is that the “cheap” places like Walmart have been forced to raise their prices to a more similar price to the mid-tier supermarkets which had more profit margin “cushion” from the beginning? Idk. A couple years ago my grocery runs would be about 20-30% cheaper than now. There seems to be less of a difference between the cheap places and mid-tier places on a lot of essentials these days, anecdotally…I’m vegetarian though, so maybe the groceries that I’m buying are different than most people
This has been the case in the UK as well. Things that were already expensive/luxury items haven't gone up that much, but the budget brand staples (rice, beans, flour, etc) have increased significantly. It's really frustrating that it's the people who have the least to give that are being squeezed the most.
Thank you! I totally agree! I went from paying $500 per month in groceries to now paying like $800 per month! That's a huge increase! It suddenly jumped in like this past February or so. I couldn't understand why the video didn't seem to show the giant jump I experienced. I don't shop at Wal-Mart because it's farther away than the 5 other grocery stores near me. But in terms of price, the stores I do go to are in the low to mid-range.
I understand inflation may be high but like.... imagine paying 2x-4x for the same food. So even if the inflation percentage is higher in the UK, the sheer dollar amount of inflation may still be higher in the US due to the higher costs in the first place
As a percentage, inflation suffers from the same problem as all percentage measurements. The initial starting price has a massive bearing on the percentage change. So a 50p increase for something that used to cost £1 is 50% but if it's initial cost was £2 then the same 50p increase would only be 25% That's why when they say that they are bringing down inflation, it's still accelerating faster than the same percentage increase would have in the past.
Loved this Evan and I would love to see a similar comparison between the UK and maybe one or two EU countries to see what the differences are like these days as I've definitely been feeling the price increases as well for my groceries here in France for example. Maybe it could be good to do say Lidl in Germany versus its British counterpart?
£34.22 that's how much more you have to spend in the US for this shopping basket, that's the real headline, I would also like to give Evan a kick up the backside for saying that inflation is down to Brexit, it has been greatly affected by the Global Pandemic and the war in Ukraine, the recent decision by OPEC to reduce oil production to keep prices high also has a major impact as this has a direct impact on distribution costs for shipping goods nationally and internationally.
Honestly it’s slightly lazy saying inflation is due to Brexit, whilst it may be a factor I’d say shutting down the economy for nearly two years whilst printing 400 billion is the biggest factor. Lockdowns, Ukraine and Brexit = a perfect storm.
@@Jake_5693 I think the point is that Brexit is actually a contributor, which is obvious, but for some reason it's a factor that must not be named by many. a part of the inflation is down to the people who voted for Brexit thinking there would be benefits to leaving the largest trade partnership in the world...
I recently visited the US for the first time and was absolutely shocked by how expensive groceries were and now consider myself lucky to be in the UK, even with inflation. Not sure why, but I was expecting everything to be much cheaper. Turned out that US prices seemed even worse than when I stayed in Iceland (the price of food being the no 1 thing everyone warned me about before going there!)
What part of the US and which store? The US has dramatically different costs of living in different regions of the US. There also is a dramatic difference between high end grocery stores and bargain grocery stores.
@@jonathanbowers8964 He said that he tried to use prices from mid-range stores, but some of his prices, particularly for produce, seem high to me. Prices, even in mid-range stores, certainly do vary a lot across the U.S. For things like produce and meats, quality can vary a lot too, though probably not as much as in the past. I moved from CA to NM in January of 1981 and almost broke down crying in the produce department because the selection and quality was so inferior to what I was used to. A few years later and I was living in NY and their potatoes couldn't hold a candle to Idaho's (but they were still very proud of their "New York potatoes", for some reason).
in Australia one of the biggest grocery chains (there's a duopoly) had a campaign in 2017 of "feed a family of four for under $10" and they would showcase meals that were reasonably tasty and could feed a standard family of four, and would cost less that $10 excluding certain ingredients (like cooking oil, salt) when bought from their store. Today 250g of fettuccini has gone up 105%, chicken fillet thighs 79%, 500g beef mince 49% (ingredients all used in their past recipes)
I couldn't believe how expensive groceries were in Canada when I moved to ON from the Netherlands in March. My grocery run which used to cost €30 in NL (about $45) was costing $90 in Ontario
@@evanI’d argue spending 400 billion whilst shutting down the economy for 18 months - 2 years is the biggest problem. Add Ukraine on top and it’s just a mess. Inflation is worldwide, it’s shockingly bad in Australia yet they haven’t left a political union. Brexit is an extra factor but it’s not the cause
@@evan but Brexit is only one of many contributing factors to inflation. It's wrong of you to try and present it as the only factor. @dominique8233 is correct, and nothing about their post is copium
Excellent video, thank you. I’m currently living with my dad to take care of him, but still paying a mortgage etc on my own house. I live on an Ill Health Retirement Pension, it’s not a lot. Changed so many things with our shopping, many more own brands, chicken legs instead of chicken breast, own brand cereal 14p per 100g, Kellogs equivalent 41p. But, our food bill is still much higher than it was. Dad turned 90 this year, his pension had an additional age-related amount. Yay! 10p per week 😩 He’s not only old, he has mixed dementia. He keeps turning the thermostat up ‘cos he’s cold. Generally on 23 deg in winter. He’s paying £240 pm for energy in an average 3 bed semi. Existing has become very difficult Thanks for pointing out the ridiculous rate of inflation here, think I’ll forward your video to my sibling in Scandinavia
i work at Aldi and love seeing what peoples opinions are on our stores and products compared to other stores, so would really like to see you do another video on it :) I hear a lot from customers saying 'it used to be really cheap in here but cause of the COL crisis its not cheap anymore' yet we have been the cheapest supermarket for 15 straight months now, so our prices may be going up, but you're still better off at Aldi than anywhere else! p.s. i promise i am not being held at gunpoint by my manager to say this tehe
I do my main shop at ALDI, it is consistently the cheapest overall, many of their own brands taste almost as good as branded goods, unfortunately not all do so you do have to be a little careful in what you buy, but generally it has the best cost to quality ratio in my opinion
I don’t shop in Aldi very often. I shop mainly online with Sainsbury’s for heavy stuff, since my two cats and I live on the top floor of a Victorian building - there are three flights of steps (66 steps in all) and the cats don’t help with bringing the groceries upstairs. It’s Lidl’s for certain products, but, whichever store I shop in, I always look for the bar code cancelled items (price reductions). If it’s freezable and something I normally would buy, I have no problem buying it. The cost of my shopping has gone down, mainly because I’ve changed my cooking habits. I cook for four, portion the food and freeze three of those portions. I like your channel Evan, your idiosyncratic humour makes listening to hard facts a bit softer on the ears…
@@randommusic4567 we have increased the amount of branded products in our stores too just in case our own brand versions just dont cut it, unfortunately people dont consider this when they mention the price of their shopping. like in the example i gave they would be telling me this and i would be scanning their shopping and seeing all the branded products they are buying and thinking well of course it seems expensive cause look at all the big brand products your buying. if you want your name brands dont complain about how expensive they are! most of these products will be merchandised right next to eachother so you can see the savings. a good example that boggles my mind is heinz tomato ketchup at £4.50 for 910g. our Bramwells to me, tastes better actually, maybe cause i have the 50% less sugar one, at only 99p for 650g. thats about 50p per 100g for heinz compared to 15p per 100g for own brand. another good example that if you take it into account is another big difference, weetabix 36 pack retails at £4.09, 11p per...brick? which may seem pretty good at first. own brand version is £1.99 for 36, just 6p each. thats nearly HALF the amount. (dont ask for the taste difference tho as i havent tried them)
When I was a kid American grocery prices always struck me as cheap compared to the UK's. It's kinda shocking to see that it's now the opposite. But that was based on where my relatives lived in Michigan- I don't know whether there's a lot of geographical variation within the USA, or whether grocery stores have just really, really been gouging Americans for the last couple of decades.
Yeah prices have increased, but geography does matter as does the "class" of grocery stores in the US. New Jersey is relatively pricey, especially compared to the Midwest, but it isn't the most expensive part of the US either (that is Silicon Valley for the Mainland and Hawaii for the nation as a whole).
@@DM-ql6ps not sure how accurate they were, but the couple lists i looked at the showed the average price of groceries actually had New Jersey near the middle of the list (note: they where listing the prices for 2023).
I remember this too, but American wages have since far surpassed ours so generally the UK is now worse off even with lower grocery prices (although I lived in the US for a while last year and the prices of some food, especially healthy/fresh stuff made me angry and miss home)
Hey, from someone who used to work in measuring inflation, it might be worth using the jevons index method to measure the inflation rates, this would make your analysis more comparable to the official figures for these items. You've used the dutot method, which in also used but for other items in the basket of goods. Also you've used the exchange rates to do the conversions, I wonder if you used the purchasing power parities to compare across countries, which is slightly more robust. For those who said why aren't you using unbranded, when collecting prices in stores for the official measures the price collectors will use the most representative item in that store, this will be based on factors such as shelf space as well as local knowledge from store staff when asked. So of a brand name has more shelf space that'll be used. This will change when groceries move to scanner data. What Evan did matches the way items are defined, i.e. a specified definition to take subjectivity out of it. Thanks for doing good work on stats communication.
14:00 yep shrinkflation is as much of an issue in the U.K. as the rate of inflation on products. A good example is the soap I buy- Wrights Traditonal bars of soap, not only has the price gone up around 10%, but the bars have gone from 125 grams to 100 grams- same packaging but they’ve modified the soap moulds so there’s now a big scoop out of one side of the bars! Crazy!
As far as I'm aware, a lot of the meats, veg and cereals have gone up more i nthe UK due to the ongoing war with Ukraine. There's no grain coming out of there, as well as some of the stuff needed to grow plants - if you want this (I want to say something to do with nitrous something something in the soils), it's costing thousands of pounds more to get. Therefore, the prices are going up to reflect it - for rearing animals, growing plants and importing grains anyway.
Been trying to get the tories out for a decade, what a mistake. They made university more expensive for me, and took away my college funding (EMA). If it wasn't for the tories we'd still be in the EU too
@@circaenBeing out of the EU has done us tremendous harm. All the reports and stats and fact have shown this. Besides, you have no clue about how the EU works. We always had sovereignty, but you've made a good point about the need for Scottish and Welsh independence.
@@welshgitIt's not though is it. In Scotland still less than 50% want independence while the rest want to remain status quo. In Wales there isn't a big enough demand for independence at all. You're still under a Labour government, not an independence government. Also as a reminder Wales voted to leave the EU and before you start saying it was all the English in Wales who voted it's all tosh. It's an excuse on the Welsh separatists part to try and pass blame onto the English for their vote cause they have seen Scotland doing it. I.e take responsibility for your decisions. What is funny is yesterday I was talking to a hard core indy nat supporter who was blaming England for everything while then comparing figures of how much better Scotland is. Then I was talking to another Scottish person who was saying that he couldn't be further away from wanting an independent Scotland. Even if independence did come about Scotland would have a new issue on its hands with the large number of unionists who become unsettled and displeased. Being a remainer and never having voted Tory in my life I was very unhappy when England left the EU, but unlike sepretists in Scotland and Wales I actually think England will be again very closely aligned to the EU and a very close friend and ally from the outside while time passes and new generations decide what way they want to move England in. I am in favour of an independent England cause Wales and Scotland are shameful in the way they behave. Can't get what they want so stamp feet and say 'We're leaving'. The people that want to separate don't even speak for the whole countries of Scotland or Wales and I find most sepretists to be Xenephobic towards English people also which is shocking.
I'm literally in the middle of my online grocery shop at the moment- stopped to watch whilst eating my dinner - and now I'm crying into my keyboard! At least I know it's not just my own mismanagment! My catfood has gone up by 32% per box in the last couple of years.....a little less if I apply my 'Nectar Point' discount.....
With oil and gas going up, due to the war in Ukraine, im not surprised are inflation is so much higher, the usa is basically shielded from that, and eggs, the reason for that, is due to bird flu, they had to cull alot of egg laying hens, so they is a shortage of egg laying hens atm
6:46 I just learned three new things in a single sentence: 1) What the word “keystone” even refers to, by looking at the shape (one of those English words I’ve heard plenty, but never stopped to think about) 2) That Pennsylvania is called the Keystone State because of its shape 3) That the Heinz logo is supposed to look like Pennsylvania! Mind: blown! Well, not really. But those are some pretty neat facts to start off my day with.
I actually need to correct those facts a tad bit. Pennsylvania itself is not in the shape of a keystone. The shape of the keystone is only the symbol of Pennsylvania. To quote an official looking website: "Pennsylvania's nickname is "The Keystone State" because it was the middle colony of the original thirteen colonies, and because Pennsylvania has held a key position in the economic, social, and political development of the United States."
Whilst inflation is too high here in the uk, it makes no sense to simply state that it is much better in the USA, if the global prices for the raw ingredients increase then a country that already charges at least double is going to have a lower headline rate of inflation as the increase is a smaller proportion of the overall price
Simmilar inflation is affecting Romania too, meat is around 60% more expensive than a year ago, anything made out of grain is also looking at 20+%, sunflower seeds (a romanian staple snack) are around double the price and they keep going up it's insane
Honestly, I keep hearing about the UKs food inflation. But I cant help but be jealous, because their horribly inflated prices are cheaper than I could ever hope to purchase food for, and they only complain. I had to go on a sandwich only diet because I cant afford to feed myself. But even only sandwiches exceeded my budget for food. US food prices may not have changed that much. But they were always high, and slowly climb even higher.
Yeah but your average salaries are nearly twice as ours, and things like housing, technology, power and fuel are also much more cheaper for the most part.
The banana was the one I actually noticed the most because it was holding out at 78p/kg for ages then all of a sudden it was £1. Apples too, I used to get the more expensive apple like jazz apples but now I've had to get the cheaper options because they've literally doubled in price. I really feel for people on low salaries, no idea how people can afford anything! My recent salary increase still makes me less well off than a year ago!
Sweet video, love the analytical side of your content. It would be interesting to see a comparison of student life now compared to when you first came to the UK. I'm currently studying and the combination of lecturers striking, tiny student loans, crazy house prices and generally rubbish background knowledge due to covid messing with a levels, it's been a tricky time. But is that particularly the case for my generation or has there always been problems for students and it's just feels worse when you're living it?
I definitely thing the student situation is a lot worse than before covid! In Ireland it's also a similar case especially because of the housing crisis it's impossible to rent even if you had the money for the ridiculous rent prices. Hang in there!
Really enjoyed this video even if it was deeply depressing to see the state of the UK right now in those numbers. So interested to see how it progresses next year. Also I'd never heard of Ground before and it sounds like exactly what I've been looking for so thanks for taking on that ad partnership! Will definitely be looking at subscribing to them.
The price difference from 2020/2021 to now in the US is astonishing. I make almost 2x as much as I did then, and I still have less after groceries now than I did then.
10:30 im willing to bet the inflation of canned tomatoes is literally *the can* not the tomatoes. I am a packaging engineer and packaging costs have shot up like no ones business.
Recently a survey showed that Waitrose is no longer the uks most expensive supermarket! Sainsbury's is!! I have a mobility disability and no car so i do my shopping at asda and get it delivered, plus i take advantage of the midweek delivery pass (£35 for the year + you get a refund if your delivery costs end up cheaper). Only annoyance is substitutions but they are much better than they used to be and now at least make sense! A few years ago I ordered dried apricots but got tinned prunes...
You need to adjust for wage growth to really get a fair comparison. Wages in the UK have increased by about 8% in the last year compared to only 4% in the US. It's the difference between inflation and wage growth that really matters. The UK still doesn't look good from that perspective, but it isn't quite as bad. (Obviously people don't all experience the same wage growth but do all pay the same prices, so individuals that haven't been getting significant pay rises are a lot worse off than the average.)
im on a low income and ive noticed a large increase in prices on the most basic stuff. cans of spaghetti hoops with sausages used to be 55p a can, but are now 95p, and things that used to be £1 are now sitting at around £1.25. it doesnt sound like much but it impacts budgets a lot. used to go to tesco and get a wee drop, and it'd spend around £15 but now, getting basically the same stuff, it's over £20 now. ouch
Yes inflation percentages are important, however at the end of the day it is still cheaper in the UK than the US. I can get the same brand tinned tomatoes shown in your video 3 for £1 in Farmfoods in the UK. It's about shopping around. Home Bargains also has better value for money in buying store cupboard foods.
I used to be able to save 20 to 30£ per week from my student loan to help with emergencies. Now i end a week with 2.50£ left over and thats only because i "chose" not to eat lunch on 2 days so I had enough food for the week. -nottingham vet student
Prices have gone up everywhere, it's COVID's fault, brexit didn't help matters in the UK... seems like the brexit hasn't just affected the UK and the commonwealth in general 🤷🏼♀️... In Australia since covid everything has gone up, even petrol, etc, can't blame the inflation on brexit or not solely at least I guess 😂 but have to wonder if the the price increase would be as much if brexit never happened, that we'll never truly know but I don't think it would be quite as bad however with covid causing chaos one can't blame brexit solely... yep just going round in circles now it seems...
It’s lazy to blame Brexit, it’s arguably one of the stupidest things to point out when the same thing is happening everywhere else, almost as if something happened worldwide in 2020. It hasn’t helped but it really isn’t the main thing that’s led to these high levels of inflation.
Milk has gone up in the UK. It’s flat lined in the last year or so, but half a pint was about 60p for the longest and now stands at 90p or 95p depending where you go. Could be slightly more at pricer places.
To say Brexit is the reason is extremely simplistic Ukraine conflict is having a huge impact energy and wheat ,sunflower oil etc Ukraine a huge part of the food change. The weather also has a huge impact.
Love these price comparisons. We spent 6 months in Köln before Covid and would love to see price comparisons there. I don’t know if Berlin would have a Rewe, but that’s a good mid level grocery store. We were routinely shocked that our grocery bill every week was 50-70% cheaper in Köln than Louisville, Kentucky.
@@arnodobler1096 yeah Lidl was super close to us. There wasn’t a Kaufland near us. Rewe, Lidl, and local organic store were our main go to. The Rewe and organic store were next to each as well as a DM and a pharmacy for actual prescriptions. The Aldi was an extra 5 minute walk, but all they had were some decent GF muffins.
What really gets me is that even though the inflation rate is crazier in the UK, the price is still so much higher in the US 😭😭 The other thing that’s interesting is that from my perspective the US has more regional differences in price, for example I grew up in the midwest where groceries are cheaper but in LA its a lot more expensive for the same stuff. Curious if thats similar in the UK or not?
Think a lot of it isnt necessarily inflation, or even passing costs on, its just companies wanting to keep/bump up their profit margins a lot of the time.
Evan, for ‘butter’ you chose Lurpak which is imported from Denmark 🇩🇰 and so wouldn’t be a fair UK comparison as it does have an import charge on it due to Brexit - I would selected Anchor Butter as a UK butter standard.
Import charges on EU good have not yet started properly. Border checks definitely have not started properly, unlike UK goods going to the EU which are properly policed. This is known as taking back control.
But Lurpak is the most popular selling 'butter' in the Uk. So the comparison is what folk buy and how much it costs, not where the food originates = £ Lurpak last year vs £ Lurpak this year. Evan seems right and done his homework 🤓
KerryGold butter which he also mentioned is an imported butter from Ireland to the USA. The USA also has popular foods here that are imported from elsewhere. I live in the Southeastern part of the USA. California grows most of the fresh produce in the USA, but those of us in the Eastern parts of the USA get ours imported from Mexico and other Central/South American countries.
Another youtuber who lives in both the US and UK, just did the same price comparison. Her findings were the US is 32% more expensive. Surprised me given the strength of the dollar.
I give myself as a single person in England 🏴 a £30 a week budget for groceries and £10 a week toiletries and £20 a month on laundry detergent. I really have to reign myself in and only buy essentials or my budget won't stretch. It's helped me learn about how bad I actually was with my finances as I used to spend money without even thinking about the cost and now I'm checking the price of everything 😂. I'm at the point that if a bus fare is cheaper than the tube then I'm on the bus even though I know it will take longer, still I've met many new people doing this and this is in London where making eye contact on public transport is a sin 😂. Inflation has been awful in England 🏴. I'm so grateful for ASDA tbh and I normally do my online shop from there. Tesco and Sainsbury's are alright but even with Clubcard and Nectar I still find them a bit hit and miss. I haven't stepped foot in a Waitrose since 2015 and don't think I'm likely to while I'm keeping to my weekly budget.
I'm a single person too and for the life of me I can't understand how you can spend £20 a month just on laundry detergent or £10 a week on toiletries. I spend nowhere near that on either of these items.
@@MarlynMeehanOh no that's just the budget I have set for them, but most weeks I don't spend the full £10. What I don't spend I transfer into a savings account on a Friday. When I first started living on a budget I was worried I hadn't set enough of a budget for toiletries 😂 and panicked that £10 might not be enough. I've stopped buying FCUK shower 🚿 gel like I used to do or Jean Paul gaultier and now have a look at what's in the supermarket or in B&M or a discount store. I do admit I do buy fabric conditioner and unstoppables so I can spend on the laundry 🧺 detergent but I don't always get Bold anymore which is my fave to be fair and I have tried the ASDA branded one and it's not bad. As long as I keep in budget I'm okay but if I overspend I panic now.
@@hey12542 That's a bit clearer my mistake for picking you up wrongly. I must admit I tried Unstoppables when they first came out in the UK and I didn't think they were worth the money and my daughter felt the same. I'm a pensioner so I don't buy luxury brand shower gels and the like but just a brand that I recognise. For a long time I had been buying Fairy Platinum dish washer tablets and my daughter told me to try Asda's own brand of the same thing as they were just as good at a fraction of the cost. She was right. The bank I'm with has an account that when I use my debit card it rounds it up to the nearest pound and deposits the difference in a separate account. So far this year I have just over £40 in that account. It's amazing how just a few pence soon mount up.
@@Jake_5693Yeah but that's just my budget maximum for it. I don't always spend that. I do confess to having the washing machine on quite a bit mind 😂. Anything I don't spend I transfer into a savings account like I do with my £10 a week toiletries budget. If I have any left over I transfer it into a savings account and leave it there.
Genuinely excellent research, Evan! I've felt the squeeze on my squids this past year, but the legwork you've evidently put into this video goes so far - seeing these numbers make it clear what's happened to this country. Despite cutbacks in my personal life I'm still feeling short on a number of goods, and every time I indulge in a rare luxury it sets me back, like, a month. It's not on! Also, request for german things..... hmmm.... harass Rammstein? 😜
I checked out my local big Tesco store last week. For the first time in several years. For decades before that, I used them for my weekly big shop. I walked out without buying anything, because I didn't have a Clubcard with me. Without a card the prices were a complete rip off. The upstairs non-food area was half empty, with cheap household items spread over the old electricals sales area. Downstairs around 25% of the groceries floor area was blocked off. Tesco is now the largest online grocery store. So I their price strategy is aimed at registered, card holding online buyers. Who can easily browse all the Clubcard offers.
This is one of the reasons to subscribe to Evan's channel. No-one else on TH-cam (and precious few on the internetat large) do these comparisons as clearly and with as much context as Evan does. So if you subscribe, you get the historical timeline in developing differences between the two countries (and not just in food prices). As a Brit with a general election coming up, these videos are useful because they givethe lie to the politicians who say: "Yes things are bad in Britain - but it's a worldwide problem and have you seen the horrors happening in food prices in the US?" Now I can say: "Yes, food inflationn is 16% in the UK versus 3% in the US." (Also, I appreciate the research that goes into making these vids- it;s sort of like geek ASMR to see lots of work being put in front of you that includes all the working out.)
To an extent - but no-one else does it as thoroughly as Evan. (He's done some excellent comparisons on cost of living and accomodation costs between the UK and various EU countries in the past.)@@gsurfer04
ehhh very kind, but bringing me back down to earth here, if I had a team I could be more thorough and do something like averaging the costs of each item across MOST chains, but just doing it with 2 for each country took AGES but thank
After watching this im am way more convinced that im doing the right thing by shopping at walmart and ditching the so-called name brands. Those prices that you quote are way higher than what i actually pay. I have seen my particular shopping list become between 10 to 15 percent cheaper since last winter and spring. Some items are still to high to be worth it so i have moved on to replacement items.....mostly in the junk food category.
Honestly something I feel should be mentioned is that the gap between Aldi and Tesco is nowhere near as big as the gap between Walmart and the American shops he showed. America is the land of extremes, yes on avg UK prices are cheaper USA has much cheaper options
Keep in mind that he is showing New Jersey prices. The prices in about half the country are going to be cheaper than what he's showing. I have found that there are definitely certain items that Wal-Mart sells that are actually MORE expensive than other mid to low costing stores. But across the board it tends to be cheaper. I highly recommend generic brands. I only buy name brands when I've already tried the off-brand and didn't like it.
Thank you so much for this. We hear “average” increases being banded about but this is so much more relatable and what I’ve been looking for. I have mobility issues and get groceries delivered. I have particularly noticed how the amount I’m getting for my £40-£50 spend is arriving in less and less crates over time. Keep up the good work Evan.
You were surprised about butter going down in price but note that in times of financial stress it is common for the most basic items like bread and butter to actually go down in price while other things are increasing (not sure if that is what is happening here)
Thacher dictate: 'you can raise information as much as you want don't touch milk and butter.' Not exactly her quote but surely that was what she meant.
Considering as a Canadian we look to the United States of America as somewhere that you can purchase food significantly cheaper and in larger quantities at that, plus more selection. So this is further eye opening. I'd love to see where Canada fits into this directly.
@@Dunybrook The prices he showed are slightly cheaper than the prices in AZ. Phoenix is lucky enough to have an Aldi and I'm really hoping we get one in the southern part of the state. We don't have a winco either, so Walmart is our best bet.
winco is in a literal handful of states so hardly counts. I could make the argument that "my local mom and pop shop has it cheaper" and it wouldn't matter
7:50 - very carefully pronounced "finance minister Jeremy Hunt" there. For anyone not immersed in British culture - there will be plenty of video clips of serious journalists mispronouncing that particular person's name (don't look for the vids while at work though!)
What horrified me is I already switch from branded items to supermarket own brands but still, my shopping cost has gone up almost 100%. Also, no more seafoods and beef or any expensive meat or vegetable, only the cheapest and largest veggies. Only be able buy chicken most of the time (cheapest in the UK) then I ended up eating supplements because I don't have enough iron now.
I'm in Poland and I remember going to a Tesco (before Kaufland bought them out a couple of years back) and buying cheese (the cheap but still real kind) for about 10PLN/kg (1.90 GBP / 2.30 USD by current exchange rates). Now it's a good sale if the price is in 20PLN range and "get your ass to store ASAP" promo if it's around 16PLN.
Well I remember Tony Blair of dodgy dossier fame once saying food was too cheap and for farmers to make a living. Good to see it's all being put right. 😀
Really interesting thanks Evan. Shrinkflation is definitely a problem. 30 cans of Diet Coke used to be around £8. Now 24 are £10.45! So many other items are affected by this too. It needs to be looked into. Roll on the election!!!
Hold on, you mean to tell me a spent a whole 6 months paying for groceries at the British equivalent of a Whole Foods?! I studied abroad in London and lived walking distance from a Waitrose so I just did most of my grocery shopping there 😂😂💀
@@evan Waitrose own brand is generally cheaper than branded so Waitrose baked beans are more than Sainsbury baked beans but still much less than heinz. If the writer was used to USA prices comparatively Waitrose would still be cheaper than back home. My husband likes Rice krispies kelloggs are about 66p per 100 Aldi and Lidl about 23p Asda and Sainsbury about 29p Waitrose and Marks about 34p we can't justify the kelloggs price but he found the cheapest ones were tasting bad but we now save by buying Waitrose instead of kelloggs. That said Aldi version of lurpak is better than Waitrose version.
Well, this made me feel a smidge better about grocery shopping here in the US. It has seemed fairly steady this past year; glad that's not just in my head. Thanks! :)
The question is...what are the cheaper (but still decent quality) alternatives to those used? I don't buy onions at $1.49 each ($1.99/lb). I can get the same onions for less than $1/lb. For example, the last time I went, a 10lb bag of onions was $6.99 ($0.70/lb). There were more expensive and less expensive options. Also, a quick search for "average cost of groceries for a family of 4" gave: UK = 253 GBP = $320 USD US = $287 USD (or about 11% less than UK).
Well keep in mind he's using New Jersey pricing and he said he was aiming at a mid-level grocery store. So those two factors itself presents with tons of variety. The prices are different through out the US in each state, and each region of each state. There's cheaper stores and more expensive stores. There's name brands and generic. So everyone in the US will be having a bit of a different experience with the exact prices. For example, the yellow onions I just bought at my store were $2.99 for a 3lb bag. But if I bought them individually, by the pound, they're more expensive.
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I disagree Evan inflation rates are more complex than that, left wing always blame brexit, what about the Ukraine war, energy going up as a result which impacts costs hugely on food. I love your videos, but sorry I have to disagree strongly on this one.
@@jasmineteehee3612 Considering that this was a comparison between US and UK prices, and both are subject to the impacts of the Ukraine war, it's reasonable to assume that the difference between the two must be at least in part due to something(s) that has only impacted onto one of these two countries, like for example abandoning barrier free trade with the trading block from which we buy around a third of our food, the EU.
"LONDON, May 25 (Reuters) - Britain's departure from the European Union has accounted for about a third of the increase in food bills for households since 2019, equivalent to about 250 pounds ($316), researchers from the London School of Economics and other universities said."
The U.S. economy has been much stronger and robust than the UK economy for years no matter how you look at it (before Brexit and after Brexit). If you look at the inflation rates, the U.S. is 3.67% and the U.K. is 6.7%!… Yeah, that’s almost half in the USA!
You've been whinging a lot more since becoming a UK citizen. You're settling in well. 😂
@@jasmineteehee3612What do you think is causing the specific difference between the US and the UK? Both have been impacted by the same global issues (Ukraine, energy prices), so what's the difference? Why is the UK economy doing so much worse?
As a uni student in the UK, this stuff really stands out to me. I'm already living with a razor thin budget each week, so when basics like meat and cheese skyrocket in price, it starts eating into money I don't have.
Milk has been pricelocked, apparently, so clearly the Tories want you to culture your own cheese and butter from that milk.
do you shop at Aldi?
@@JBG-AjaxzeMediaas someone who shops there, it's definitely more expensive than last year 😢
You're US counterparts are doing even worse.
When I was a University student (it was long ago, I am 77 y/o) and felt I needed to economise, I gave up both meat and store-bought bread. But one needs to pay attention to nutrition. Allow me to suggest the cookboook "Diet For a Small Planet."
You should do this yearly. Will be very interesting to see over several years the differences.
You mean depressing*
@@conormurphy4328 no I mean what I said: interesting to see over several years the differences. Even if things are harder it is still interesting to see the differences. The differences in how interest rates rise and/or fall each year, the difference between UK and America each year, how much things go up each year. It might be disturbing but it is also interesting because it gives people a better perspective of things.
I'd expect to see the UK get cheaper again. Some foods are already dropping back down in price as cost pressures ease, and the healthy competition between supermarkets will ensure those cost decreases are quickly fed back to the customer.
I am an unemployed single adult living in Scotland. - The differences in prices over the last three years (?), mean I spend a lot longer time in each supermarket trying to find the cheapest decent substitute for every item, and often just don't get them at all. It hurts to see a bag of food items that used to cost me £ 20 ish now is smaller and costs £ 35 ish.Ouch.
Yeah every shop used to cost me £20 but these days I’m happy if it’s £40 🥲
When I was at uni, I was surrounded by a number of supermarkets. So I used a couple of price comparison apps “trolley” and “Latest deals” and they must have saved me hundreds.
You'll then have flexibility to shop at at times when they the yellow stickers, like I do. Up to 65% off in Tesco on Sunday and over 50% at M&S after 16.30 everyday.
I have found it's cheaper to shop online. I used to shop in Aldi would spend around 80 me Mrs and 4 kids. Now I'm spending about £90 with Sainsbury's. I went into Aldi recently and ended up spending well over £100 so I find online is better as you don't end up picking up random crap.
@@anthonyferris8912 Tesco has 3 times in the day where they reduce some items. 4pm and 8pm are the main ones but I think the third is 6 or 7pm on meats.
When I moved from the Netherlands to Canada in March I couldn't believe how expensive groceries were. My typical grocery run which cost €30 in NL cost $90 in Canada (about €60).
And prior to the Ukraine invasion my grocery run had been €20 in NL.
Thankfully prices in Canada have actually dropped since then and my typical grocery bill is now around $70. I'm not sure what the change has been in NL during that time
Groceries in Canada have been insane for a long time (when I was in the US in 2003 Canada was cheap for groceries, but when I lived in Canada in 2010 it was crazy expensive) but I did find that my Canadian wage made it pretty affordable. Food inflation is running about 10% in the Netherlands still, so it's rough but slightly better than the UK.
Oh damn... And if you go to the cheapest grocery discounter? That made a huge difference when I was in the USA.
@@foxy3711 in both cases just going to a midrange neighbourhood supermarket. There's not much price variation between supermarkets in Canada (within a given area)
Living in the Netherlands. I did not see my groceries drop in price since March, but it did not increase noticably either unlike the year before that.
Before 9/11 when travel between the US and Canada was super easy, a lot of Canadians would travel south to do their shopping south of the border once a week.
I think it's also important to mention that the average salaries in each country are different - in the USA it sits just under $60k (roughly £48k) whereas in the UK it is around £32k (roughly $39k).
Not for everyone. I'm on a fixed income and it's getting harder and harder. I make less than half of $60,000 yr
It depends if you’re using mean or median averages. This could mean a near $15,000 difference in the US. This brings our average to median to pretty similar amounts. $47,000 in the UK vs $48,000 in the US. The US mean would be considerably higher because mean is more sensitive to extremities and the US has a much higher number of extremely wealthy individuals.
Surely that isnt the most common for uk wages. What is the most common wage?
Growth in annual wages since 2010 is one of the worst in the developed world too. 0.1%, whereas the US 17%. Our government have failed us and this is solely due to us bending over for uncle Sam!
@@PikaJess123yeah that's the average. Minimum full time wage is around £20k
I know that this is insane for the UK, but as a US student who had to buy groceries for the first time when I studies abroad in Liverpool, coming back to the US and buying groceries there was a terrible wake-up call
Don’t be poor
@@TheRockkickassbro what 💀
@@vibes6717 Just don't. Not complicated.
@@TheRockkickass bruh
@@KittyCleary it’s a simple solution
I work for the NHS, so my salary went up by less than 2%. So much for thanking us for getting through the pandemic.
We clapped, that's all the tories said you needed
So sorry to hear that because you guys were real heroes. Here, have a flower, one of my kids is a nurse. You have my respect and appreciation. 🌹
They're all angels...well apart from the one that was murdering babies and her bosses who covered for her.
The ones I feel sorry for are all the Support workers. When I worked in the NHS briefly and it was very brief due to the blame culture and sheer laziness of some staff, I found I was being used to do so many different things as a support worker while the nurses spent their time doing paper work 🙄. When I started the job I was expected to know everything even though I'd never worked in a clinic before. Once I realised I was doing 100 different things that nurses were asking me to do while they stood around chatting I thought 'Sod this for a game of laughs I'm off'. They were shocked when I said 'Thanks very much here's my notice and it's because I'm here to be a support worker not a general dogs body thanks'.
I went back into being a night care assistant at a nursing home and I much preferred that as I was part of a team. So it's the support workers that should get a huge pay rise and the clapping and the nurses are important as they do so much but do transfer a lot onto support workers too.
Couldn't you pay your rent with all those claps? /s
One thing I’ve found out about grocery costs in the US these days is that prices at the same chain can vary a lot by neighborhood. A US gallon of milk (4ish liters, not the same as a UK gallon) is a dollar or more cheaper at one grocery store vs the same brand at the same chain ten miles away.
Actually milk is something adults really don't buy that much unless they have kids in their home. (I think...anyway, that's how it is in our home.)
@@beckypetersen2680 That's nice. A lot of us do have kids, though. Obviously I buy milk as I brought it up. Also, it's an easy metric for how costs for the same item vary widely based on a short distance. The point wasn't the milk other than as an example, it was that prices on the same goods can vary a lot even on very short distances and even when coming from the same store and distributor.
But okay, cool. Eggs are also a big cost difference. Breakfast cereal cost difference varies, but it's almost always more expensive in the suburbs - even the poor ones - than the city.
Produce prices vary a lot by season so I don't have a good feeling for how much those prices are different between stores. Meat tends to be pretty similar in prices.
Definitely. I live in a fairly low income neighborhood and I get most of my groceries at Kroger. The rich neighborhood a couple of miles away also has a kroger, but they are almost 25% more expensive, just because they can be. It's all the same goods.
Also I'm an adult with no kids and I go through about a gallon of milk per week.
@@beckypetersen2680 it’s a vital ingredient for tea making… so people get through quite a lot in the uk…
As well as tea, most adults (>80% per market research) eat cereal, and 30% of us eat it daily, it's by far the most common form of breakfast here and save for the veggies, everyone has it with milk.
I think a huge contributing factor at Tesco and Sainsbury's has been the rise in Clubcard and Nectar prices. I completely get why you didn't include this in your comparison, but it has been a massive scam that has driven up RRPs. Clubcard prices aren't actually much better than the regular price at other supermarkets, if at all, but the RRPs are ridiculously high so that we feel that we're making a saving. Clubcard prices are now the old regular prices, for most items. When there is a genuine manufacturer offer, at Tesco and Sainsbury's it's locked behind a "give-us-all-your-personal-details" wall, whereas at places like ASDA it's accessible to all customers. I'd be interested to see what this inflation comparison is like at supermarkets such as ASDA, Aldi or Lidl, as they don't have the same sorts of marketing ploys.
I personally would like to see this taking into account Clubcard prices; A. To show how much money a clubcard "saves" you, and B. Literally everyone uses a clubcard now so it's not representing the prices most people pay. I can completely understand why the clubcard prices weren't taken into account though.
Also I know Evan said ASDA is low tier as a store, but honestly, it's not really that cheap. I think it would have been a fair comparison.
The US stores do the same thing. If you use the club card and only buy staples that will keep when on the rotating sale; the prices are normally 50-33% lower if not more. If ACME works like Safeway and Albertsons they have digital coupons too. When that started they jacked all the prices up so the digital coupon club price is similar to the old price.
@@lee53_ Maybe I'm just stubborn, but I absolutely refuse to use a club/nectar card. It's known that the supermarkets use these to collect huge amounts of extremely valuable and private data about you and sell it to whoever wants to pay. I kinda wish more people saw it for what it is and started calling the big chains out for it.
@@zanzabar4ky7This! Hannaford/ Food Lion (any other chain the big company may have) + places like Kroger have their own membership cards and sometimes their sales with membership still leave certain foods pricier than somewhere else.
Can be managed if you happen to live close to multiple places on a budget to adjust how you shop but for those who can’t travel much or have access they have to pay the extra
I'm a student so just shop for myself and this time last year I was paying like £10-£12 for a decent part of my weekly shopping besides the random things I grabbed in the week. This year I'm paying like almost £18-£20 for the same bulk of my shop. Then when I grab things in the week it's definitely also more expensive. I'm fortunate to be quite financially safe for a student but I can see how it affects other people around me.
It’s also more costly to buy just for yourself. I ended up freezing everything to make it last long enough to consume it, like broccoli especially. Fortunately, even though Wilko’s is gone now, they built a Lidl right next to my old uni a couple years ago, so most of the students are okay. But then students at my old uni are generally better off because those are typically the sort to go there. If it was my local university, then I know a lot of students there struggle. All my loan went on rent and bills, plus about £300 of my wages during second year, but fortunately my job paid well enough that I could handle the food bill on 8hrs a week. But I think I would not have lasted if I had to work longer to pay for food inflation. My course was tough enough as it was.
I found a cheaper place over the pandemic, but still didn’t have much spare change until I went back home to take a break after the course ended and to earn money to drive. Problem is that at the rate things are going, the price of lessons etc. will have doubled by the time I reach the current amount I need. 🙄
Brexit and Truss have murdered the country’s economy compared to what it was.
I’m sure most voters did not even bother to pick up a GCSE textbook to learn about what they were actually voting on.
Never mind that we used to have one of the most privileged positions in the EU, and had enough backing to actually talk about international issues.
Now we’re just the laughing stock of Europe. I’d argue that only America is worse out of the developed countries, but only because women are losing their rights and their politics is only a bit worse than ours. But at least they have enough power to back themselves up, even without being part of a trade bloc.
Yea, the global pandemic, lockdown and central banks pumping trillions into a frozen economy has caused huge price spikes around the globe, but the UK was uniquely different, it was Brexit.😂😅
@@anthonyferris8912 Compounding factors. UK is worse off because it is all of Brexit, the war in Ukraine and the pandemic.
While the rest of the world "only" has to contend with the war and the pandemic.
@@57thorns Except that the UK has a small growth in economy but EU countries like Germany etc. are in negative or stagnant growth. So Brexit's impact is now negligible.
@@anthonyferris8912 it's the price of electric, gas and fuel that push-up costs
I’d be genuinely interested in an Aldi comparison. I do 90% of my shopping there and even there it’s feeling very expensive recently.
I have seen that too.
ive found that aldi/lidl have become proportionately more expensive than the big super markets, ie, that whilst the prices at all have gone up, the differential between aldi and sainsburys for example have got smaller. So ive actually found aldi less attractive because of general price rises, which is kind of ironic/unexpected.
My wife and I just moved the the UK for postgrad programs and we were so surprised at how much cheaper food (and particularly produce) is compared to the US. Of course, five mins of job hunting on Indeed shows how low the wages are relative to the US as well though 😆😭 thanks for the follow-up vid Evan! You’ve been super helpful in the transition of moving to the UK ❤
I agree! The British produce is so much less expensive and usually much better quality and tastier! The only two exceptions are avocados and mangoes 😂
What jobs are you looking at?. It's all relative.
If i moved to America, i would get paid double, but through costs and taxes and insurance, i would end up with less and a poorer quality of life. That and the x100 likelihood of becoming a victim of violent crime.
Anyway, what jobs are you looking at? I might be able to help. Looking online isn't always the way to go.
The ups and downs of life… I have to laugh otherwise I’d be crying! Survival mode on 😂
Violent crime per capita is much higher in the UK than in the USA. 2-3 times higher in fact.@@terranaxiomuk
@@MagentaOtterTravelsWtf, all I get is rotten produce still in date, old wrinkly salad veggies, etc. Shetland sucks.
Uk here, i have had to start making everything from scratch, bread, pasta, sauces etc i also started buying from the reduced section and freezing it. Im still paying double what i used to in groceries, but my new way of doing things is definitely helping me put a bit more money towards heating or electric or diesel, which has also increased :(
This shit is inhumane! I was born in a communist dictatorship but quality of life is worse here in UK. Healthcare was even more accessible.
I used to shop predominately in Lidl but it closed down in the city I live in. I moved onto Aldi and Asda but all my shopping is just getting more and more expensive. I slowly start buying less and thinking of cheaper meals to cook because it is not sustainable to keep spending more for the same amount of food when my paycheck does not change at all.
It's almost like Brexit was a terrible idea. Who'd have thunk it?
Except inflation is due to the pandemic, loads of countries across the globe have had record inflation including the USA, how is that linked to Brexit?
@@orwellboy1958 because all countries had the pandemic, all countries are affected by the war in Ukraine, yet the UK is the only country whose growth is similar to Russia's (which is to say terrible, and embarrassing seeing as Russia has global trade sanctions). Hmmm. What unique circumstance has Britain gone through that would affect it that way?
@@orwellboy1958If only a group of people who advocated against it advised that there would be negative consequences, but that would just be projecting fear, wouldn’t it?
@@dominictemple yes, like remoaners convinced they were going to die because they couldn't get their meds. I remember all the black flags on twatter.
@@hughtube5154 growth simalar to Russia? Someone's been listening to the MSM. Inflation in the UK is very high, I admit but to only blame Brexit is very blinkered. Evan is not taking into account other factors like house prices and fuel prices in the USA which have been and maybe still are at record highs not to mention lumber which is not such a big deal here but in the USA definitely is.
The Edinger Prices Index (EPI) is clearly the new benchmark for monitoring inflation. Governments of the world, take note!
For your Germany vids, i'd love to hear from people who've moved from places like the US, UK, Scandinavia etc into Germany and their experiences adjusting. I think it's always fascinating seeing the cultural differences between cultures you'd assume are quite similar (Like the UK and Germany for instance)
I’m thinking of moving from Shetland, maybe to Germany but in Transylvania I grew up surrounded by Transylvanian Saxon culture so it wouldn’t be a shock. Do you watch Uyen? The Vietnamese lady who moved to Germany to be with her bf. She’s very funny 😄
All I can say is that "mid-range" has been out of my range for a long time. I've had to shop at Walmart, like most people in my area, and Walmart's prices are about 50% more than they were a couple of years ago.
I've been straight up begging Americans to look at how hard inflation has been hitting us in the UK, because a lot of them are talking about inflation as a reason to ditch Biden and it's like... you have no idea how much worse it'll get.
We should also be talking about running out the corporations on a rail as they are the driver of inflation. There are no government petrol stations or supermarkets.
It's how the traditional media siloes things. We're not told in America, except if you find the right TH-camr, that we have the least inflation of any big developed country, because financial and international news are two completely separate beats.
@@nlpnt also it very much depends on how the organizations calculate inflation rates. It can very much between countries.
Just to offer another perspective outside of supermarkets, I work in a local village shop where clubcards and memberships obviously aren't a thing anyone needs to worry about. Every week when new stock comes in and i update the prices on our system, well over 60% of items have increased in RRP. i'd actually guess near 80% but seems safer to lowball it.
Its worth noting that we will sell some items slower, so more time will pass between when they're ordered and updated, (it's not like everything is increasing every week,) but still, I've seen some massive increases in price because of it. Our country got some real problems right now.
Considering the USA larger domestic agricultural scene I'm amazed by some of the US prices
A lot of the fresh produce is shipped overseas, particularly to China (17% back in 2017). That year, about 20% of US fresh produce was exported. I don't know what it is today. In 2022, China for the 2nd year in a row was the largest importer of US fresh produce. I can't find the current percentage though. The USA imports about 15% of its food according to a March 2023 comment made by the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA). These figures lead me to believe that it is being kept artificially high.
US agriculture is mostly huge industrial farms, so potatoes mostly come from Idaho, apples from Washington, corn from the Midwest, oranges from Florida, etc. Most stuff won't be grown locally, wherever you are.
@@kadams3029 Most oranges I've seen have "South Africa" labels or "Africa" labels and say packaged in California. The "halos" mandarin oranges I just bought at the store say "Product of South Africa" and "Packed by Wonderful Citrus Packing, Delano, CA 93215". Even though Florida is only a couple of States away from me. Most of the vegetables I buy from the store are from South of the Border. Very little fresh produce from here in the States seems to make it to my store.
@@laurie7689Florida orange crops have tanked year over year and won't stop going down anytime soon.
Especially given the subsidies in that sector.
I’m in the U.K. and I do a weekly online shopping for a family of 5.
Every week I need to calm myself down as I get so angry about the prices.
I can feel the anger growing as the price rises on my online basket.
We used to be able to go to other shops and find alternatives or buy the same item cheaper somewhere else. But now prices are very static and it’s difficult to find bargains to feed the family, and I am a quite savvy shopper and cook. I keep putting things that I need in the basket, just to remove it, then I have to chose which ones we can’t live with for the week. It’s infuriating!
One family member works in a supermarket that has shown that they have made so much profit that’s insane.
This is probably why I feel angry and take myself on a time out every time I do the family shopping.
There's definitely unnecessary profiteering going on, they did the same thing in the pandemic, it shouldn't be allowed, people are already struggling because of inflation, then their greed ads on unnecessary higher prices which is criminal!
I think that I should add that in the case of the UK there have been external factors that have added in an additional kick in inflation in some categories. Cereal/grain product prices are still being massively affected by the Ukrainian war as well as weather that led to a reduction in supply, something that the US wasn't affected by. Canned tomatoes were clobbered by last year's European heatwave, leading to a massive shortfall in production compared to normal years, and is expected to fall back closer to the real inflation rate as this season's crop starts hitting the shelves.
However, it is also clear that there is a definite chunk of inflation caused by the UK government's policies (or lack thereof) on food supply that has not been experienced by the rest of Europe.
The only caveat I'd put for sales prices is that Sainsburys and Tesco have gone a bit mad with their member only pricing, they're not really sales a lot of the time as using the card just means that you're paying the normal price everywhere else.
I've been seeing many cases of products being cheaper at Waitrose than the non-Nectar/Clubcard price.
Welcome the the usa side of the world who have been dealing with this robbery since 2021. Almost entirely when the Usa left Billions in Afghanistan and also tried to make workers in the usa dragged down the price of the wages they expected worthlessness by driving up inflation. See what happened in the mediaeval peasants who asked for higher wages as a way of getting over their ‘betters’ as all going through world wide!
This is planned, and absolutely a way for those earning‘better’ after covid shutdown reshuffling of jobs to go back in their places. Yet we resist!
Now, we have ro go back to unions to survive instead of being drawn into poverty.
This is a fundamental war against those who would exploit us vs. those whom have everything, but won’t pay.
This is a war against the haves vrs the have nots, and we need to take out the Prince Charles’s and the political overlords in order to survive. We can NOT WHAT HAPPENED WITH Edward the 3rd to talk us down. We must DEVOUR THEM ALL!
And I still vote for a god damned purge, as those in charge will die the most, despite the war parades of the USA armed forces, as those who serve ARE OVERWHELMINGLY IN POVERTY, and are not let out of poverty by joining, nor their aftercare satisfactory. We are a country ready to revolt. I hope you all in other countries fill your ranks with these who will get you weapons, as they help a WHOLE LOT. At the bargaining table.
NEVER TRUST FOREIGN POWERS, and ALWAYS TRUST YOUR GUNS AND anti military WEPONS!
History doesn’t need to be REPRODUCED!
Everyone, get ready for war, cause you are gonna need it!
Fuck the loyalty card/member card price bollocks. Just another way to screw over anyone who doesn't have a card or forgets to take it, which given the sheer number of them these days, is easy to do.
I have a weekly delivery of groceries and I have certainly noticed the increase in one simple way. To get free delivery, I need to spend £40, a year or so ago, I used to end up adding cleaning or other non perishable items most weeks to get over the threshold. Now I just add the basics and it is over the limit already!
I think if you're going to compare items it's usually a good idea to give a range of prices, so rather than 1 loaf of bread about the middle of the price range you instead do 4 or 5 loafs across the spectrum. This then gives a really good idea of how it affects the pricing as a whole.
Obviously not a thing you can do when you only have one price to compare too,but just an idea if this is going to be a regular thing.
As an American who has always shopped at Walmart (I’m a poor student lol), I’ve noticed that the prices have gone up significantly more in the past year than they appear in this video. My guess is that the “cheap” places like Walmart have been forced to raise their prices to a more similar price to the mid-tier supermarkets which had more profit margin “cushion” from the beginning? Idk. A couple years ago my grocery runs would be about 20-30% cheaper than now. There seems to be less of a difference between the cheap places and mid-tier places on a lot of essentials these days, anecdotally…I’m vegetarian though, so maybe the groceries that I’m buying are different than most people
Walmart has really gone up and i feel they're trying to be more like target
This has been the case in the UK as well. Things that were already expensive/luxury items haven't gone up that much, but the budget brand staples (rice, beans, flour, etc) have increased significantly. It's really frustrating that it's the people who have the least to give that are being squeezed the most.
Thank you! I totally agree! I went from paying $500 per month in groceries to now paying like $800 per month! That's a huge increase! It suddenly jumped in like this past February or so. I couldn't understand why the video didn't seem to show the giant jump I experienced. I don't shop at Wal-Mart because it's farther away than the 5 other grocery stores near me. But in terms of price, the stores I do go to are in the low to mid-range.
What a great resource! Thank you! So glad you kept your notes :) And yeah, paying attention to amounts in the packages sold has been key lately
I understand inflation may be high but like.... imagine paying 2x-4x for the same food. So even if the inflation percentage is higher in the UK, the sheer dollar amount of inflation may still be higher in the US due to the higher costs in the first place
As a percentage, inflation suffers from the same problem as all percentage measurements. The initial starting price has a massive bearing on the percentage change. So a 50p increase for something that used to cost £1 is 50% but if it's initial cost was £2 then the same 50p increase would only be 25% That's why when they say that they are bringing down inflation, it's still accelerating faster than the same percentage increase would have in the past.
Love how you show the Price Lock for basics over the shelves of wine 😂😂
wine is a basic hehe
@@evan 10000% this!
Without spirits, you know that the basic household shuts down! Shoot!!!
When you see those inflated prices you will need some booze to get over the Initial shock 🥂
Loved this Evan and I would love to see a similar comparison between the UK and maybe one or two EU countries to see what the differences are like these days as I've definitely been feeling the price increases as well for my groceries here in France for example. Maybe it could be good to do say Lidl in Germany versus its British counterpart?
I'd love to see Germany added to it this year!
I’ll live in Dublin and would like to see how it compares
Brilliant video Evan, can tell a lot of effort went into every aspect of it and it's very appreciated!
Thank youuu. Trying to display all the data in an interesting and engaging way is genuinely difficult but I tried my best
£34.22 that's how much more you have to spend in the US for this shopping basket, that's the real headline, I would also like to give Evan a kick up the backside for saying that inflation is down to Brexit, it has been greatly affected by the Global Pandemic and the war in Ukraine, the recent decision by OPEC to reduce oil production to keep prices high also has a major impact as this has a direct impact on distribution costs for shipping goods nationally and internationally.
Honestly it’s slightly lazy saying inflation is due to Brexit, whilst it may be a factor I’d say shutting down the economy for nearly two years whilst printing 400 billion is the biggest factor.
Lockdowns, Ukraine and Brexit = a perfect storm.
@@Jake_5693 I think the point is that Brexit is actually a contributor, which is obvious, but for some reason it's a factor that must not be named by many.
a part of the inflation is down to the people who voted for Brexit thinking there would be benefits to leaving the largest trade partnership in the world...
Brexit is a contributing factor to our inflation which is higher than our peers
I recently visited the US for the first time and was absolutely shocked by how expensive groceries were and now consider myself lucky to be in the UK, even with inflation.
Not sure why, but I was expecting everything to be much cheaper. Turned out that US prices seemed even worse than when I stayed in Iceland (the price of food being the no 1 thing everyone warned me about before going there!)
@philallen4989 ha, yeah I spent a week self catering in the store lol
@@rgp1989you could tbh, their non-frozen range is surprisingly versatile
It's because they also did their own Brexit and left the British empire.😆
What part of the US and which store? The US has dramatically different costs of living in different regions of the US. There also is a dramatic difference between high end grocery stores and bargain grocery stores.
@@jonathanbowers8964 He said that he tried to use prices from mid-range stores, but some of his prices, particularly for produce, seem high to me. Prices, even in mid-range stores, certainly do vary a lot across the U.S. For things like produce and meats, quality can vary a lot too, though probably not as much as in the past. I moved from CA to NM in January of 1981 and almost broke down crying in the produce department because the selection and quality was so inferior to what I was used to. A few years later and I was living in NY and their potatoes couldn't hold a candle to Idaho's (but they were still very proud of their "New York potatoes", for some reason).
in Australia one of the biggest grocery chains (there's a duopoly) had a campaign in 2017 of "feed a family of four for under $10" and they would showcase meals that were reasonably tasty and could feed a standard family of four, and would cost less that $10 excluding certain ingredients (like cooking oil, salt) when bought from their store. Today 250g of fettuccini has gone up 105%, chicken fillet thighs 79%, 500g beef mince 49% (ingredients all used in their past recipes)
We have reduced our spending at the big 2 to save money. They’re thieves.
Seeing that pic of a cucumber. It’s $1.99 minimum here in Canada. Ridiculous
I couldn't believe how expensive groceries were in Canada when I moved to ON from the Netherlands in March. My grocery run which used to cost €30 in NL (about $45) was costing $90 in Ontario
Prices in Europe are also rocketing. Easy to blame certain things in the UK without looking at the bigger picture.
easy to ignore all the problems caused by brexit if you ignore all the data and huff on copium
@@evan😂😂😂
@@evanI’d argue spending 400 billion whilst shutting down the economy for 18 months - 2 years is the biggest problem. Add Ukraine on top and it’s just a mess.
Inflation is worldwide, it’s shockingly bad in Australia yet they haven’t left a political union.
Brexit is an extra factor but it’s not the cause
@@evan but Brexit is only one of many contributing factors to inflation. It's wrong of you to try and present it as the only factor. @dominique8233 is correct, and nothing about their post is copium
Excellent video, thank you. I’m currently living with my dad to take care of him, but still paying a mortgage etc on my own house. I live on an Ill Health Retirement Pension, it’s not a lot. Changed so many things with our shopping, many more own brands, chicken legs instead of chicken breast, own brand cereal 14p per 100g, Kellogs equivalent 41p. But, our food bill is still much higher than it was.
Dad turned 90 this year, his pension had an additional age-related amount. Yay! 10p per week 😩
He’s not only old, he has mixed dementia. He keeps turning the thermostat up ‘cos he’s cold. Generally on 23 deg in winter. He’s paying £240 pm for energy in an average 3 bed semi.
Existing has become very difficult
Thanks for pointing out the ridiculous rate of inflation here, think I’ll forward your video to my sibling in Scandinavia
i work at Aldi and love seeing what peoples opinions are on our stores and products compared to other stores, so would really like to see you do another video on it :)
I hear a lot from customers saying 'it used to be really cheap in here but cause of the COL crisis its not cheap anymore' yet we have been the cheapest supermarket for 15 straight months now, so our prices may be going up, but you're still better off at Aldi than anywhere else!
p.s. i promise i am not being held at gunpoint by my manager to say this tehe
that's what someone at gunpoint by their manager WOULD say
I do my main shop at ALDI, it is consistently the cheapest overall, many of their own brands taste almost as good as branded goods, unfortunately not all do so you do have to be a little careful in what you buy, but generally it has the best cost to quality ratio in my opinion
I don’t shop in Aldi very often. I shop mainly online with Sainsbury’s for heavy stuff, since my two cats and I live on the top floor of a Victorian building - there are three flights of steps (66 steps in all) and the cats don’t help with bringing the groceries upstairs. It’s Lidl’s for certain products, but, whichever store I shop in, I always look for the bar code cancelled items (price reductions). If it’s freezable and something I normally would buy, I have no problem buying it. The cost of my shopping has gone down, mainly because I’ve changed my cooking habits. I cook for four, portion the food and freeze three of those portions. I like your channel Evan, your idiosyncratic humour makes listening to hard facts a bit softer on the ears…
@@randommusic4567 we have increased the amount of branded products in our stores too just in case our own brand versions just dont cut it, unfortunately people dont consider this when they mention the price of their shopping. like in the example i gave they would be telling me this and i would be scanning their shopping and seeing all the branded products they are buying and thinking well of course it seems expensive cause look at all the big brand products your buying. if you want your name brands dont complain about how expensive they are!
most of these products will be merchandised right next to eachother so you can see the savings. a good example that boggles my mind is heinz tomato ketchup at £4.50 for 910g. our Bramwells to me, tastes better actually, maybe cause i have the 50% less sugar one, at only 99p for 650g. thats about 50p per 100g for heinz compared to 15p per 100g for own brand.
another good example that if you take it into account is another big difference, weetabix 36 pack retails at £4.09, 11p per...brick? which may seem pretty good at first. own brand version is £1.99 for 36, just 6p each. thats nearly HALF the amount. (dont ask for the taste difference tho as i havent tried them)
Sorry I’m a dirty little Lidl slut
When I was a kid American grocery prices always struck me as cheap compared to the UK's. It's kinda shocking to see that it's now the opposite. But that was based on where my relatives lived in Michigan- I don't know whether there's a lot of geographical variation within the USA, or whether grocery stores have just really, really been gouging Americans for the last couple of decades.
They've been gouging us
Yeah prices have increased, but geography does matter as does the "class" of grocery stores in the US. New Jersey is relatively pricey, especially compared to the Midwest, but it isn't the most expensive part of the US either (that is Silicon Valley for the Mainland and Hawaii for the nation as a whole).
It's a bit of both. New Jersey, the state the US groceries are from in this video, is one of the more expensive states.
@@DM-ql6ps not sure how accurate they were, but the couple lists i looked at the showed the average price of groceries actually had New Jersey near the middle of the list (note: they where listing the prices for 2023).
I remember this too, but American wages have since far surpassed ours so generally the UK is now worse off even with lower grocery prices (although I lived in the US for a while last year and the prices of some food, especially healthy/fresh stuff made me angry and miss home)
Hey, from someone who used to work in measuring inflation, it might be worth using the jevons index method to measure the inflation rates, this would make your analysis more comparable to the official figures for these items. You've used the dutot method, which in also used but for other items in the basket of goods.
Also you've used the exchange rates to do the conversions, I wonder if you used the purchasing power parities to compare across countries, which is slightly more robust.
For those who said why aren't you using unbranded, when collecting prices in stores for the official measures the price collectors will use the most representative item in that store, this will be based on factors such as shelf space as well as local knowledge from store staff when asked. So of a brand name has more shelf space that'll be used. This will change when groceries move to scanner data. What Evan did matches the way items are defined, i.e. a specified definition to take subjectivity out of it.
Thanks for doing good work on stats communication.
14:00 yep shrinkflation is as much of an issue in the U.K. as the rate of inflation on products. A good example is the soap I buy- Wrights Traditonal bars of soap, not only has the price gone up around 10%, but the bars have gone from 125 grams to 100 grams- same packaging but they’ve modified the soap moulds so there’s now a big scoop out of one side of the bars! Crazy!
This has been really good video. We've all been complaining the price has gone up but actually seeing broke down like this has been great
As far as I'm aware, a lot of the meats, veg and cereals have gone up more i nthe UK due to the ongoing war with Ukraine. There's no grain coming out of there, as well as some of the stuff needed to grow plants - if you want this (I want to say something to do with nitrous something something in the soils), it's costing thousands of pounds more to get. Therefore, the prices are going up to reflect it - for rearing animals, growing plants and importing grains anyway.
nothing to do with any war....
Been trying to get the tories out for a decade, what a mistake. They made university more expensive for me, and took away my college funding (EMA). If it wasn't for the tories we'd still be in the EU too
Yeah, not having a second international government on top of you is doing you harm.
need someone to govern the UK government look what happens otherwise....@@circaen
@@mistersmoker7443Putin please 👍
@@circaenBeing out of the EU has done us tremendous harm. All the reports and stats and fact have shown this. Besides, you have no clue about how the EU works. We always had sovereignty, but you've made a good point about the need for Scottish and Welsh independence.
@@welshgitIt's not though is it. In Scotland still less than 50% want independence while the rest want to remain status quo. In Wales there isn't a big enough demand for independence at all. You're still under a Labour government, not an independence government. Also as a reminder Wales voted to leave the EU and before you start saying it was all the English in Wales who voted it's all tosh. It's an excuse on the Welsh separatists part to try and pass blame onto the English for their vote cause they have seen Scotland doing it. I.e take responsibility for your decisions.
What is funny is yesterday I was talking to a hard core indy nat supporter who was blaming England for everything while then comparing figures of how much better Scotland is. Then I was talking to another Scottish person who was saying that he couldn't be further away from wanting an independent Scotland. Even if independence did come about Scotland would have a new issue on its hands with the large number of unionists who become unsettled and displeased. Being a remainer and never having voted Tory in my life I was very unhappy when England left the EU, but unlike sepretists in Scotland and Wales I actually think England will be again very closely aligned to the EU and a very close friend and ally from the outside while time passes and new generations decide what way they want to move England in. I am in favour of an independent England cause Wales and Scotland are shameful in the way they behave. Can't get what they want so stamp feet and say 'We're leaving'. The people that want to separate don't even speak for the whole countries of Scotland or Wales and I find most sepretists to be Xenephobic towards English people also which is shocking.
I'm literally in the middle of my online grocery shop at the moment- stopped to watch whilst eating my dinner - and now I'm crying into my keyboard!
At least I know it's not just my own mismanagment!
My catfood has gone up by 32% per box in the last couple of years.....a little less if I apply my 'Nectar Point' discount.....
Are you a cat....
@@robertmcconnell1009ahahahah
@@robertmcconnell1009that’s none of your business
If you use your legs and go to the store, you'll see the discounts. Try it.
@@robertmcconnell1009 No, but I have 3 to feed, which now costs me considerably more than it did!
With oil and gas going up, due to the war in Ukraine, im not surprised are inflation is so much higher, the usa is basically shielded from that, and eggs, the reason for that, is due to bird flu, they had to cull alot of egg laying hens, so they is a shortage of egg laying hens atm
6:46 I just learned three new things in a single sentence:
1) What the word “keystone” even refers to, by looking at the shape (one of those English words I’ve heard plenty, but never stopped to think about)
2) That Pennsylvania is called the Keystone State because of its shape
3) That the Heinz logo is supposed to look like Pennsylvania!
Mind: blown! Well, not really. But those are some pretty neat facts to start off my day with.
I threw those in hoping they’d be new to people not from near Pennsylvania :)
I actually need to correct those facts a tad bit. Pennsylvania itself is not in the shape of a keystone. The shape of the keystone is only the symbol of Pennsylvania. To quote an official looking website: "Pennsylvania's nickname is "The Keystone State" because it was the middle colony of the original thirteen colonies, and because Pennsylvania has held a key position in the economic, social, and political development of the United States."
Whilst inflation is too high here in the uk, it makes no sense to simply state that it is much better in the USA, if the global prices for the raw ingredients increase then a country that already charges at least double is going to have a lower headline rate of inflation as the increase is a smaller proportion of the overall price
Yea and most of our inflation was about 2 years ago so now they just inching and coasting
This should be the top voted comment
Simmilar inflation is affecting Romania too, meat is around 60% more expensive than a year ago, anything made out of grain is also looking at 20+%, sunflower seeds (a romanian staple snack) are around double the price and they keep going up it's insane
Honestly, I keep hearing about the UKs food inflation.
But I cant help but be jealous, because their horribly inflated prices are cheaper than I could ever hope to purchase food for, and they only complain.
I had to go on a sandwich only diet because I cant afford to feed myself. But even only sandwiches exceeded my budget for food.
US food prices may not have changed that much. But they were always high, and slowly climb even higher.
But your wages increase, no?
@@tt-ew7rx🥲 if only. I've got hope with the popularity & strength of unions rising.
Yeah but your average salaries are nearly twice as ours, and things like housing, technology, power and fuel are also much more cheaper for the most part.
@@Mmjk_12 yeah, salaries. sucks for hourly workers.
@@tt-ew7rx No.
The banana was the one I actually noticed the most because it was holding out at 78p/kg for ages then all of a sudden it was £1. Apples too, I used to get the more expensive apple like jazz apples but now I've had to get the cheaper options because they've literally doubled in price. I really feel for people on low salaries, no idea how people can afford anything! My recent salary increase still makes me less well off than a year ago!
27p if u want a single banana in Tesco Express
Sweet video, love the analytical side of your content. It would be interesting to see a comparison of student life now compared to when you first came to the UK. I'm currently studying and the combination of lecturers striking, tiny student loans, crazy house prices and generally rubbish background knowledge due to covid messing with a levels, it's been a tricky time. But is that particularly the case for my generation or has there always been problems for students and it's just feels worse when you're living it?
I definitely thing the student situation is a lot worse than before covid! In Ireland it's also a similar case especially because of the housing crisis it's impossible to rent even if you had the money for the ridiculous rent prices. Hang in there!
Really enjoyed this video even if it was deeply depressing to see the state of the UK right now in those numbers. So interested to see how it progresses next year. Also I'd never heard of Ground before and it sounds like exactly what I've been looking for so thanks for taking on that ad partnership! Will definitely be looking at subscribing to them.
I have never seen an advert I'm interested in before in a TH-cam video, until now! Great video, great sponsorship 😊
The price difference from 2020/2021 to now in the US is astonishing. I make almost 2x as much as I did then, and I still have less after groceries now than I did then.
10:30 im willing to bet the inflation of canned tomatoes is literally *the can* not the tomatoes. I am a packaging engineer and packaging costs have shot up like no ones business.
Recently a survey showed that Waitrose is no longer the uks most expensive supermarket! Sainsbury's is!!
I have a mobility disability and no car so i do my shopping at asda and get it delivered, plus i take advantage of the midweek delivery pass (£35 for the year + you get a refund if your delivery costs end up cheaper). Only annoyance is substitutions but they are much better than they used to be and now at least make sense! A few years ago I ordered dried apricots but got tinned prunes...
You need to adjust for wage growth to really get a fair comparison. Wages in the UK have increased by about 8% in the last year compared to only 4% in the US. It's the difference between inflation and wage growth that really matters. The UK still doesn't look good from that perspective, but it isn't quite as bad. (Obviously people don't all experience the same wage growth but do all pay the same prices, so individuals that haven't been getting significant pay rises are a lot worse off than the average.)
It's called product inflation when you compare just groceries, and groceries inflation is closer to 10%
im on a low income and ive noticed a large increase in prices on the most basic stuff. cans of spaghetti hoops with sausages used to be 55p a can, but are now 95p, and things that used to be £1 are now sitting at around £1.25. it doesnt sound like much but it impacts budgets a lot. used to go to tesco and get a wee drop, and it'd spend around £15 but now, getting basically the same stuff, it's over £20 now. ouch
I get my cans of spaggy hoops from ASDA, they're only 19p ;-). For some reason, Lidl's cheapest beans are also my favourite which is handy.
Yes inflation percentages are important, however at the end of the day it is still cheaper in the UK than the US. I can get the same brand tinned tomatoes shown in your video 3 for £1 in Farmfoods in the UK. It's about shopping around. Home Bargains also has better value for money in buying store cupboard foods.
Absolutely....
My cousin was over from the states last week, and couldn't believe how low the prices were in the supermarket.
I used to be able to save 20 to 30£ per week from my student loan to help with emergencies. Now i end a week with 2.50£ left over and thats only because i "chose" not to eat lunch on 2 days so I had enough food for the week. -nottingham vet student
Prices have gone up everywhere, it's COVID's fault, brexit didn't help matters in the UK... seems like the brexit hasn't just affected the UK and the commonwealth in general 🤷🏼♀️...
In Australia since covid everything has gone up, even petrol, etc, can't blame the inflation on brexit or not solely at least I guess 😂 but have to wonder if the the price increase would be as much if brexit never happened, that we'll never truly know but I don't think it would be quite as bad however with covid causing chaos one can't blame brexit solely... yep just going round in circles now it seems...
It’s lazy to blame Brexit, it’s arguably one of the stupidest things to point out when the same thing is happening everywhere else, almost as if something happened worldwide in 2020.
It hasn’t helped but it really isn’t the main thing that’s led to these high levels of inflation.
@@Jake_5693yeah that's what I was saying,
Milk has gone up in the UK. It’s flat lined in the last year or so, but half a pint was about 60p for the longest and now stands at 90p or 95p depending where you go. Could be slightly more at pricer places.
You can buy milk in half pints? I paid 90p for a pint at Aldi and that's the smallest they do. Where do you shop?
Yeah I feel this, my wage hasn't moved alot in the last few years but the groceries sure have, this isn't even considering shrinkflation
To say Brexit is the reason is extremely simplistic Ukraine conflict is having a huge impact energy and wheat ,sunflower oil etc Ukraine a huge part of the food change. The weather also has a huge impact.
Sure is, but Brexit didn't make it any better, and the border checks haven't even been implemented yet.
Love these price comparisons. We spent 6 months in Köln before Covid and would love to see price comparisons there. I don’t know if Berlin would have a Rewe, but that’s a good mid level grocery store. We were routinely shocked that our grocery bill every week was 50-70% cheaper in Köln than Louisville, Kentucky.
REWE is located throughout Germany, including in Berlin. It's also more expensive like Kaufland and Lidl.
@@arnodobler1096 yeah Lidl was super close to us. There wasn’t a Kaufland near us. Rewe, Lidl, and local organic store were our main go to. The Rewe and organic store were next to each as well as a DM and a pharmacy for actual prescriptions. The Aldi was an extra 5 minute walk, but all they had were some decent GF muffins.
@@eosterday I hope you had a good time in Germany.🙋♂️
@@arnodobler1096 it was good, but my visa and 3rd party contract were cancelled due to Covid.
@@eosterday A pity
What really gets me is that even though the inflation rate is crazier in the UK, the price is still so much higher in the US 😭😭
The other thing that’s interesting is that from my perspective the US has more regional differences in price, for example I grew up in the midwest where groceries are cheaper but in LA its a lot more expensive for the same stuff. Curious if thats similar in the UK or not?
In the UK supermarket prices are the same across the country when comparing the same store format
The wages in US for same jobs are much higher than UK hence the higher prices
Think a lot of it isnt necessarily inflation, or even passing costs on, its just companies wanting to keep/bump up their profit margins a lot of the time.
Evan, for ‘butter’ you chose Lurpak which is imported from Denmark 🇩🇰 and so wouldn’t be a fair UK comparison as it does have an import charge on it due to Brexit - I would selected Anchor Butter as a UK butter standard.
Import charges on EU good have not yet started properly. Border checks definitely have not started properly, unlike UK goods going to the EU which are properly policed. This is known as taking back control.
Why isn't that fair? Why should products for this comparison come from the UK?
But Lurpak is the most popular selling 'butter' in the Uk. So the comparison is what folk buy and how much it costs, not where the food originates = £ Lurpak last year vs £ Lurpak this year. Evan seems right and done his homework 🤓
KerryGold butter which he also mentioned is an imported butter from Ireland to the USA. The USA also has popular foods here that are imported from elsewhere. I live in the Southeastern part of the USA. California grows most of the fresh produce in the USA, but those of us in the Eastern parts of the USA get ours imported from Mexico and other Central/South American countries.
It isn't imported, it's made by Arla Foods in the UK...and there isn't any import tariffs anyway, the UK has a free trade agreement with the EU.
Another youtuber who lives in both the US and UK, just did the same price comparison. Her findings were the US is 32% more expensive. Surprised me given the strength of the dollar.
Well it is somewhat comforting to know that even with our ludicrous inflation we're still nowhere near as bad as the USA
Yes, he's not gone back lol
I liked the way you had to remember to pronounce the H in Jeremy Hunt. I could see the struggle to hold back from changing it to a C 😅
Thank you for picking up on that lmao I didn't know if the sponsor would catch on but they didn't eh. H U M O U R
I give myself as a single person in England 🏴 a £30 a week budget for groceries and £10 a week toiletries and £20 a month on laundry detergent. I really have to reign myself in and only buy essentials or my budget won't stretch. It's helped me learn about how bad I actually was with my finances as I used to spend money without even thinking about the cost and now I'm checking the price of everything 😂. I'm at the point that if a bus fare is cheaper than the tube then I'm on the bus even though I know it will take longer, still I've met many new people doing this and this is in London where making eye contact on public transport is a sin 😂. Inflation has been awful in England 🏴. I'm so grateful for ASDA tbh and I normally do my online shop from there. Tesco and Sainsbury's are alright but even with Clubcard and Nectar I still find them a bit hit and miss. I haven't stepped foot in a Waitrose since 2015 and don't think I'm likely to while I'm keeping to my weekly budget.
I'm a single person too and for the life of me I can't understand how you can spend £20 a month just on laundry detergent or £10 a week on toiletries. I spend nowhere near that on either of these items.
@@MarlynMeehanOh no that's just the budget I have set for them, but most weeks I don't spend the full £10. What I don't spend I transfer into a savings account on a Friday.
When I first started living on a budget I was worried I hadn't set enough of a budget for toiletries 😂 and panicked that £10 might not be enough. I've stopped buying FCUK shower 🚿 gel like I used to do or Jean Paul gaultier and now have a look at what's in the supermarket or in B&M or a discount store.
I do admit I do buy fabric conditioner and unstoppables so I can spend on the laundry 🧺 detergent but I don't always get Bold anymore which is my fave to be fair and I have tried the ASDA branded one and it's not bad. As long as I keep in budget I'm okay but if I overspend I panic now.
@@hey12542 That's a bit clearer my mistake for picking you up wrongly. I must admit I tried Unstoppables when they first came out in the UK and I didn't think they were worth the money and my daughter felt the same. I'm a pensioner so I don't buy luxury brand shower gels and the like but just a brand that I recognise.
For a long time I had been buying Fairy Platinum dish washer tablets and my daughter told me to try Asda's own brand of the same thing as they were just as good at a fraction of the cost. She was right.
The bank I'm with has an account that when I use my debit card it rounds it up to the nearest pound and deposits the difference in a separate account. So far this year I have just over £40 in that account. It's amazing how just a few pence soon mount up.
20 on laundry detergent? How? 😂 That’s a family of four price 😂
@@Jake_5693Yeah but that's just my budget maximum for it. I don't always spend that. I do confess to having the washing machine on quite a bit mind 😂. Anything I don't spend I transfer into a savings account like I do with my £10 a week toiletries budget. If I have any left over I transfer it into a savings account and leave it there.
Genuinely excellent research, Evan! I've felt the squeeze on my squids this past year, but the legwork you've evidently put into this video goes so far - seeing these numbers make it clear what's happened to this country. Despite cutbacks in my personal life I'm still feeling short on a number of goods, and every time I indulge in a rare luxury it sets me back, like, a month. It's not on!
Also, request for german things..... hmmm.... harass Rammstein? 😜
I checked out my local big Tesco store last week. For the first time in several years. For decades before that, I used them for my weekly big shop. I walked out without buying anything, because I didn't have a Clubcard with me. Without a card the prices were a complete rip off. The upstairs non-food area was half empty, with cheap household items spread over the old electricals sales area. Downstairs around 25% of the groceries floor area was blocked off. Tesco is now the largest online grocery store. So I their price strategy is aimed at registered, card holding online buyers. Who can easily browse all the Clubcard offers.
This is one of the reasons to subscribe to Evan's channel.
No-one else on TH-cam (and precious few on the internetat large) do these comparisons as clearly and with as much context as Evan does. So if you subscribe, you get the historical timeline in developing differences between the two countries (and not just in food prices).
As a Brit with a general election coming up, these videos are useful because they givethe lie to the politicians who say: "Yes things are bad in Britain - but it's a worldwide problem and have you seen the horrors happening in food prices in the US?"
Now I can say: "Yes, food inflationn is 16% in the UK versus 3% in the US."
(Also, I appreciate the research that goes into making these vids- it;s sort of like geek ASMR to see lots of work being put in front of you that includes all the working out.)
To an extent - but no-one else does it as thoroughly as Evan. (He's done some excellent comparisons on cost of living and accomodation costs between the UK and various EU countries in the past.)@@gsurfer04
ehhh very kind, but bringing me back down to earth here, if I had a team I could be more thorough and do something like averaging the costs of each item across MOST chains, but just doing it with 2 for each country took AGES but thank
After watching this im am way more convinced that im doing the right thing by shopping at walmart and ditching the so-called name brands. Those prices that you quote are way higher than what i actually pay. I have seen my particular shopping list become between 10 to 15 percent cheaper since last winter and spring. Some items are still to high to be worth it so i have moved on to replacement items.....mostly in the junk food category.
Honestly something I feel should be mentioned is that the gap between Aldi and Tesco is nowhere near as big as the gap between Walmart and the American shops he showed.
America is the land of extremes, yes on avg UK prices are cheaper USA has much cheaper options
Keep in mind that he is showing New Jersey prices. The prices in about half the country are going to be cheaper than what he's showing. I have found that there are definitely certain items that Wal-Mart sells that are actually MORE expensive than other mid to low costing stores. But across the board it tends to be cheaper. I highly recommend generic brands. I only buy name brands when I've already tried the off-brand and didn't like it.
If you remove the Pound crashing vs the USD, the inflation is basically nothing (around 0.5%) in the UK if we use your average number.
Thank you so much for this. We hear “average” increases being banded about but this is so much more relatable and what I’ve been looking for. I have mobility issues and get groceries delivered. I have particularly noticed how the amount I’m getting for my £40-£50 spend is arriving in less and less crates over time. Keep up the good work Evan.
You were surprised about butter going down in price but note that in times of financial stress it is common for the most basic items like bread and butter to actually go down in price while other things are increasing (not sure if that is what is happening here)
Thacher dictate: 'you can raise information as much as you want don't touch milk and butter.'
Not exactly her quote but surely that was what she meant.
Not in Australia. Some breads are up over 40%!
Random observation: Your hair looks great! what shampoo/products do you use?
That is very kind. I'm definitely in need of a chop to ensure it's healthier! I use Aesop's Shampoo and Conditioner or a Lush "Daddy-O"
@@evan Sounds expensive, cut it all off and you can just use soap and water, I jest do your thing.
Considering as a Canadian we look to the United States of America as somewhere that you can purchase food significantly cheaper and in larger quantities at that, plus more selection. So this is further eye opening. I'd love to see where Canada fits into this directly.
I was just in the UK and was surprised how much cheaper things were than in Costa Rica.
WINCO, NOT WALMART is the cheapest brand in the usa. Bar non, Walmart has more stores. Huge, HUGE DIFFERENCE!
I was about to say this. Seems like he's out of touch with the USA and New Jersey is one of the most expensive states for groceries for some reason.
@@Dunybrook The prices he showed are slightly cheaper than the prices in AZ. Phoenix is lucky enough to have an Aldi and I'm really hoping we get one in the southern part of the state. We don't have a winco either, so Walmart is our best bet.
winco is in a literal handful of states so hardly counts. I could make the argument that "my local mom and pop shop has it cheaper" and it wouldn't matter
7:50 - very carefully pronounced "finance minister Jeremy Hunt" there. For anyone not immersed in British culture - there will be plenty of video clips of serious journalists mispronouncing that particular person's name (don't look for the vids while at work though!)
What horrified me is I already switch from branded items to supermarket own brands but still, my shopping cost has gone up almost 100%. Also, no more seafoods and beef or any expensive meat or vegetable, only the cheapest and largest veggies. Only be able buy chicken most of the time (cheapest in the UK) then I ended up eating supplements because I don't have enough iron now.
I'm in Poland and I remember going to a Tesco (before Kaufland bought them out a couple of years back) and buying cheese (the cheap but still real kind) for about 10PLN/kg (1.90 GBP / 2.30 USD by current exchange rates). Now it's a good sale if the price is in 20PLN range and "get your ass to store ASAP" promo if it's around 16PLN.
the milk had me shook because over the last year I was forced to shop at co op, and the 1pint milk went up by 40p! sainsburys is where it's at
I can remember when 1 pint was 40p in Asda it's 90p now.
Lol M&S and waitrose are expensive but co-op is like dystopian
Well I remember Tony Blair of dodgy dossier fame once saying food was too cheap and for farmers to make a living. Good to see it's all being put right. 😀
Honestly, I wouldn't mind paying more if it was to support local farmers rather than corporate shareholders.
Really interesting thanks Evan. Shrinkflation is definitely a problem. 30 cans of Diet Coke used to be around £8. Now 24 are £10.45! So many other items are affected by this too. It needs to be looked into. Roll on the election!!!
Oh, A 24 pack is around $13-14 where I am in the US
Spain had a lot of rain this year that’s where we get the majority of tomatoes and cucumbers. Remember we ran out of tomatoes earlier this year
Stop spoiling the narrative. It's all those beastly Tories and Brexit. 😆
Oh it’s still brexit we were further down the pecking order when it came to what stock was available
Hold on, you mean to tell me a spent a whole 6 months paying for groceries at the British equivalent of a Whole Foods?! I studied abroad in London and lived walking distance from a Waitrose so I just did most of my grocery shopping there 😂😂💀
Waitrose is the spenny shop mate
@@evan Waitrose own brand is generally cheaper than branded so Waitrose baked beans are more than Sainsbury baked beans but still much less than heinz. If the writer was used to USA prices comparatively Waitrose would still be cheaper than back home. My husband likes Rice krispies kelloggs are about 66p per 100 Aldi and Lidl about 23p Asda and Sainsbury about 29p Waitrose and Marks about 34p we can't justify the kelloggs price but he found the cheapest ones were tasting bad but we now save by buying Waitrose instead of kelloggs. That said Aldi version of lurpak is better than Waitrose version.
At least you ate well 🤷♂️🤣
Well, this made me feel a smidge better about grocery shopping here in the US. It has seemed fairly steady this past year; glad that's not just in my head. Thanks! :)
I enjoy this little series!! Thanks for keeping us updated dude. :)
The question is...what are the cheaper (but still decent quality) alternatives to those used?
I don't buy onions at $1.49 each ($1.99/lb). I can get the same onions for less than $1/lb. For example, the last time I went, a 10lb bag of onions was $6.99 ($0.70/lb). There were more expensive and less expensive options.
Also, a quick search for "average cost of groceries for a family of 4" gave:
UK = 253 GBP = $320 USD
US = $287 USD (or about 11% less than UK).
Well keep in mind he's using New Jersey pricing and he said he was aiming at a mid-level grocery store. So those two factors itself presents with tons of variety. The prices are different through out the US in each state, and each region of each state. There's cheaper stores and more expensive stores. There's name brands and generic.
So everyone in the US will be having a bit of a different experience with the exact prices.
For example, the yellow onions I just bought at my store were $2.99 for a 3lb bag. But if I bought them individually, by the pound, they're more expensive.