Some time ago, I had a bit of a sticker shock at Costco. I had calculated out the cost of a dozen eggs to be around $1.30; suddenly, I looked at the price and said, “Waitasecond, WHAT?”
The same five dozen eggs I used to buy for $6.49 had shot up to $9.49. What the hey?!
Well, time passed and I got used to paying $1.90 per dozen for my eggs. Then a lady started bringing her farm-fresh eggs to the farmer’s market, and I got used to paying $1.50 per dozen.
Then her hens needed a month off to molt, and I ran out of eggs, and I thought, “Supermarket here I come!”
And then I had a heart attack and died because eggs were $3.50 a dozen, the end.
Just kidding. I didn’t actually die. But I was absolutely floored.
THREE DOLLARS AND FIFTY CENTS. For a dozen eggs.
Guess what? The government announced Friday that the cost of food had gone up yet again. (Source article here: Costs Surge for Stocking the Pantry , with thanks to Boston Gal’s Open Wallet for pointing it out)
With a few exceptions, nearly every grocery category measured by the Labor Department, which compiles the official inflation numbers, has increased in the last year. Milk is up 17 percent, as are dried beans, peas and lentils. Cheese is up 15 percent, rice and pasta 13 percent, and bread 12 percent.
No food product has gone up as much as eggs, jumping 25 percent since February 2007 and 62 percent in the last two years.
AH-HA! So, I’m not crazy! (hush!) I had started to wonder if maybe I had simply been wrong about how much a dozen eggs cost ‘back in the day’.
But I wasn’t.
They really have gone up that much.
Dang.
I was kind of hoping it was a pre-Easter scam, you know? And that after Easter, they’d be all, “Just kidding!” and bring the prices back down?
Guess not.
Hold onto your wallets, kids, 2008 is going to be a bumpy ride…
Recipe Tuesday: Hoisin Chicken Tray Bake
3 days ago
8 comments:
Time to invest in some chickens, and a cow.
i moved from utah to pennsylvania over christmas. i thought it was just an east-coast thing, eggs being so much. guess not. *sigh*
When milk hit $3.98 for 1%, my husband said, "thats it. we're drinking coke from now on, it's only 99 cents!" No wonder we are all fat, we can't afford to buy real food anymore.
If eggs get to be too crazy price-wise, we will buy some chickens. At least we live in an area where that is possible. I draw the line at a cow, though...for now. ;~)
No chickens for me - I have a bird-thing ever since I watched Hitchcock's "The Birds" at a much too tender age - now they totally freak me out. I just weep every time I buy milk now, which I do very frequently since we go through about 5 gallons every week. It's amazing how these things sneak up on us, I guess part of it is the gas prices / shipping costs factored in.
Ha! I've been complaining about the rise in egg prices for months! And our local Albertson's charges--ready for this?--$4.99 a dozen. I went to the store for eggs and just refused to buy them. Trader Joe's sells them for $1.90.
Those eggs you buy at Costco are from some miserable chickens who live in cages too small for movement and who never get a break - they leave the lights on all night so they lay twice a day.
Pay the $3.50 and get your eggs from happy chickens - totally worth it.
And yea - bumpy ride ahead with this economy. The good news is that once the Bush administration admits we're in trouble we will probably be on the way out.
Eh, unfortunately, the $3.50 eggs are still from miserable chickens. The 'cage free' variety at the supermarket are $5 for half a dozen. Jeez. That would cost me $25 a week!
Now, the lady at the farmer's market has cage-free hens and sells their eggs for a buck fifty a dozen. But, her birds are molting right now. No eggs. Phooey. I can't wait for April!!
Post a Comment