Hosted by Kai Ryssdal

Get the Podcast

Get the Podcast

• Apple
• Spotify
• Amazon Music
• Stitcher
• RSS

You’re not imagining it: prices throughout the economy have gotten higher since the start of the pandemic. Whether that’s the gas you pay at the pump, concert tickets or your groceries. 

Inflation began to surge in 2021, reaching a new 40-year high of 9.1% in June 2022. 

Economists have attributed rising prices to a combination of various causes, including the stimulus checks distributed at the beginning of the pandemic, high demand and low supply, the Russia-Ukraine war, and, of course, the concept of “greedflation,” or the idea that corporations are using inflation as an excuse to raise prices even higher. 

Some of these factors, you’ll find, experts disagree about vehemently. 

To tame inflation, the Federal Reserve adopted a strategy of aggressively raising interest rates 11 consecutive times between early 2022 and summer of this year (which had the effect of raising the cost of certain items, like new monthly mortgages). 

While inflation has begun to ease and the central bank has paused rates, Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell recently suggested he doesn’t think we’re in the clear yet. 

“Inflation is still too high, and a few months of good data are only the beginning of what it will take to build confidence that inflation is moving down sustainably toward our goal,” Powell said in a speech at the Economic Club of New York. 

We took a look at how much the prices of some goods have changed between 2019 and now. 

Source: Bureau of Labor Statistics

A gallon of gas in September cost about 52% more than the same period in 2019. During the pandemic, gas prices had increased due to supply and demand issues, which were exacerbated by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022. The U.S. banned all energy imports from Russia, while the European Union partially banned oil imports. In June 2022, gas cost more than $5 a gallon. It’s fluctuated since then, but there’s some good news pointing to a decline in prices. Oil demand is dropping around the world, while U.S. production is strong this year. According to AAA’s gas prices, a regular gallon is down by 7 cents compared to this same time a week ago.

Source: Kelley Blue Book, 2019 and 2023 reports

Car prices rose to record highs during the pandemic due to the same reason a lot of goods have risen: supply chain issues.  A global chip shortage forced car companies to cut down on production. We are beginning to see prices decline since last year, but the average price of a new car stood at almost $48,000 this September, which is $10,000 more than it was in September 2019. A report from S&P Global Mobility released in June found that auto lenders are seeing more auto loan delinquencies as consumers grapple with inflation and higher interest rates.

Source: LendingTree 

It’s a tough housing market. The average monthly mortgage payment for the third quarter of this year rose by nearly $300 since the third quarter of 2019, according to data provided to Marketplace by LendingTree. Mortgage rates have hit their highest level in two decades, with the average 30-year fixed rate standing at 7.63% for the week ending Oct. 19. That’s more than double the rate it was around this period in 2019. To combat inflation, the Federal Reserve hiked rates almost a dozen times between 2022 and 2023, which has influenced the high mortgage rates we’ve been seeing. Prospective buyers not only have to deal with rising mortgage rates, but higher home prices, too, and some even have trouble qualifying for a mortgage. Because of financial pressure, the number of adults living in multigenerational households has quadrupled between 1971 and 2021, according to the Pew Research Center.

Source: Child Care Aware of America

Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen has called the child care industry “a broken market.” The annual cost of child care rose by more than $1,100 between 2019 and 2022, the most recent data available from the organization Child Care Aware of America. Child care workers are getting paid more (even though pay is still lower compared to what other service workers get), while providers have to pay more now for goods and services, like food and utilities, reported The Wall Street Journal. The federal government has provided child care providers with more than $24 billion throughout the pandemic, but the funding expired last month. Marketplace reported that this means we’re likely to see even higher prices and resources become even more scarce. As a result of unaffordable child care, some women are kept out of the workforce.

Source: Bureau of Labor Statistics

The price for a carton of 12 grade A eggs, since 2019, has increased 50%. Last year, egg prices began rising and at one point even doubled, thanks in part to the bird flu, which infected more than 57 million hens in the U.S. Consumers and bakeries felt the pinch, with the shortages getting so bad that some people even tried to smuggle the goods from Mexico. Egg prices have declined from their record high of $4.82 back in January, providing shoppers with much needed relief, but remain higher than pre-pandemic levels as of September.

Source: Bureau of Labor Statistics

The average cost for a 16 oz. malt beverage, if you were buying it at a retail store, cost 30 cents more in September of this year than it did back in 2019. CNBC reported that beer companies are losing the alcohol market to spirits. They’ve had to raise prices because they’ve faced increased packaging and transportation costs. Prices are also increasing for beer bought at breweries and other places outside of retail, while sales are declining. The historic Anchor Brewing Company, America’s first craft brewery, announced over the summer that it’s shutting down after 127 years.

Sources: Thrillist, Starbucks’ app listed prices

The famed PSL is now back at Starbucks, but comes with a higher price tag. The cost will vary depending on location, but back in 2019, the price for a tall PSL ranged between $4.45 and $5.45, for an average of $4.95, according to Thrillist. For this year, we looked at the prices listed on the Starbucks app for more than a dozen locations around the U.S., finding that the PSL costs between $5.25 and $6.25 at those stores. That averages out to $5.75. Vox’s Emily Stewart did a deep dive into the economics of coffee and found that – along with prices just generally increasing across the board – coffee businesses pay the most for labor and labor is getting more expensive. Stewart said workers are asking for higher wages, while lower-wage workers are seeing “significant wage gains.” Those are all positives, Stewart noted, but that means business are passing on higher costs to you. In Starbucks’ case specifically, the company raised wages in an effort to combat unionization and is also spending money on revamping its stores.

Source: The Economist’s Big Mac Index

Call it burgernomics. The price of a Big Mac this summer jumped 87 cents since the summer of 2019, according to The Economist’s Big Mac Index, which shows how much the burger costs in countries around the world. The goal of the index is to show how different currencies are performing against each other. In the U.S., fast-food prices have increased across the board, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. The bureau’s index for limited service meals rose 0.4% month-over-month in September. But even though chains have had to raise prices due to the higher cost of labor and ingredients, that hasn’t deterred customers, Marketplace reported earlier this year. Groceries and traditional restaurants have also become more expensive, pushing richer customers to get their fix at fast food restaurants.

Sources: Amazon, Netflix, Disney, CNBC, Variety

The average person subscribes to about three streaming services. If you have subscriptions to three most popular services (Netflix, Prime Video and Disney+), you’ve seen your overall bill go up by a total of almost $10 a month since 2019 if you’re paying for the cheaper of their ad-free subscriptions. Streamers are struggling to pull in more customers thanks to an oversaturated market. Many in the U.S. have a Prime membership, which includes access to Prime Video, but if you’re paying for Prime Video itself, that’ll run you $8.99 – which was also the cost back in 2019. However, Netflix’s price for a standard subscription (no ads) has gone from $12.99 a month to $15.49, while the price for a Disney+ subscription without ads has gone from $6.99 to $13.99 a month.

Source: SeatGeek

Live entertainment has gotten pricier. The average resale price for a concert ticket on SeatGeek has almost doubled over the past four years. And these are just the averages overall – as mega pop star Taylor Swift has embarked on her “Eras” tour, the average resale price for her concert reached $1,611, according to a representative for SeatGeek.

“After the pandemic, we saw how much people missed live music, and explosive ticket demand backs that up,” said Oliver Marvin, director of business operations at SeatGeek, in an emailed statement. “Since 2019, consumer spending has shifted to experiences over possessions, and artists are getting better at promoting themselves globally through their online presence. 

Tickets prices for some concerts are already expensive before they hit the resale market. The Atlantic reported that several possible factors are contributing to higher prices, including pent-up demand following quarantine, the cost of running a big show (which is getting higher due to inflation), artists deciding to raise prices because they see their peers doing it, and high fees from Ticketmaster, which merged with Live Nation back in 2010. The two control a majority of the market for ticketing and live events. 

Stories You Might Like

Consumers are getting used to higher inflation

Why we’re seeing rising consumer prices

Food pantries are feeling squeezed by inflation, just like those they serve

Consumers aren’t worried about spiking prices — yet

The “hungriest summer”: Food banks say food insecurity is rising again

Consumer prices jumped again in May