Chart of the Day: Real Egg Prices, 1890-2011
CARPE DIEM
Professor Mark J. Perry's Blog for Economics and Finance
Wednesday, February 23, 2011
About Me
- Name: Mark J. Perry
- Location: Washington, D.C., United States
Dr. Mark J. Perry is a professor of economics and finance in the School of Management at the Flint campus of the University of Michigan. Perry holds two graduate degrees in economics (M.A. and Ph.D.) from George Mason University near Washington, D.C. In addition, he holds an MBA degree in finance from the Curtis L. Carlson School of Management at the University of Minnesota. In addition to a faculty appointment at the University of Michigan-Flint, Perry is also a visiting scholar at The American Enterprise Institute in Washington, D.C.
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21 Comments:
I've got old farm journals that record the egss sold and the price.
In those days, the value of eggs sold was a significant part of the money needed to run the farm.
The same number of eggs sold today wouldn't move a decimal point.
This doesn't tell us anything about the quality of the eggs or the welfare of the hens.
The graph is clearly a lie. We've already established in the previous post regarding food prices, that the average working class American is spending more on food today than ever before, because the top 10% get all the money, and food stamp rates have increased. To top it all off, there is huge inflation and the government is lying about it...and American eggs suck anyway because everyone knows they are full of hormones and...something else I read on wikipedia.
Thank you.
what was beef up, 14% last year and 60% since 2000?
http://www.mongabay.com/images/commodities/charts/beef.html
so much for steak and eggs.
how about wheat? up 50% in the second half of 2010 alone.
so, no toast either.
http://www.indexmundi.com/commodities/?commodity=wheat
maybe corn bread?
nope. up 100% in 2010 and 250% since 2002.
http://futures.tradingcharts.com/chart/CN/M
bacon?
pork bellies up 37% in 2010.
http://tfc-charts.w2d.com/chart/PB/M
orange juice?
up over 60% in 2010.
http://futures.tradingcharts.com/chart/OJ/M
boy, it's getting tough to find something to eat with my eggs.
The rural sop ethanol program has boosted corn prices, but eggs show what typically happens with all commodities and manaufactured goods: They get cheaper over time.
Military hardware and services are an exception, thanks to Congressional meddling and the usual bureaucratic ossification.
I share concerns that working class people in America are falling behind, but does not mean inflation is understated. It means income and wealth are becoming stratified. One should not conflate the issues.
"The rural sop ethanol program ..."
Actually the ethanol program is driven by the lefts on going fantasy of an "oil free world". So, in effect, the program simply subsidizes the production of a renewable "green fuel" helping to ease the environmental psychosis of urban leftists.
"Military hardware and services are an exception ..."
No, military equipment gets cheaper and cheaper all the time. A single F-15E has the destructive capacity of an entire squadron of WWII bombers. JDAMS make it possible to destroy targets with a single bomb that it used to take multiple bombing runs to take out. The new "Punisher" rifle will give troops an instant destructive capacity that used to require field artillery. Etc, etc.
How is it that someone who writes so much about the military knows so little about it?
"but eggs show what typically happens with all commodities and manaufactured goods: They get cheaper over time."
really?
oil is cheaper?
coal?
corn?
cars?
toothpaste?
homes?
where do you shop benji? i must be going to the wrong stores.
the continuous commodity index is up 248% since the beginning of 2002. that's an 15% per year compounded inflation over the last 9 years.
so how do you figure that commodities go down in price?
CI is made up of metals, fuels, grains, livestock, and soft ag produce, so it's pretty comprehensive.
http://commodities.about.com/od/understandingthebasics/a/cci-index.htm
how about some data to back up your claim that commodities and manufactured goods go down in price.
also note:
eggs did not get cheaper. that's an inflation adjusted number.
it also looks like it's been trending up for 5 years.
See, I told you. Its all a LIE.
Things are getting more expensive, and the average working class American (where is this working class chap working at? The coal mines?) is spending more of their money on food.
No amount of charts will change this indisputable fact. For example, did you know that 500g of cheese at the supermarket today costs as much as 900g used to before? Vangel figured it out...But thanks to cleaver trickery, and government LIES...we think things are getting cheaper.
Well, ask that average working class American what he thinks. Ask the poor chap working at the coal mines (where his starting salary is a pitiful 60k)
You can't hug babies with JDAM arms Che...you can't hug babies :p
"eggs did not get cheaper. that's an inflation adjusted number."
Ha!! I felt this needed to be quoted for posterity
Frank Morgan:
In recent years, there has been a commodities boom. But over the long run, commodities tend to get cheaper. Manufactured goods, adjusted for quality, also get cheaper--Dr. Perry has had many posts about this, but it should be obvious even to you. What does that high-def color TV costs today, vs. the b/w set with tubes of yesteryear? Cars are far better than they were in the 1960s and 1970s.
Che: Corn is rural, Red state lard-snuffling waste and regulation. Name for me the R-Party rural Senator willing to stand up to this wasteful socialism.
BTW, I wholeheartedly concur that it was originally Democrats, back in the LBJ-FDR days (LBJ started as a TX congressman in the 1930s) who promulgated extensive rural welfare, usually by getting the feds to pay for infrastructure, but including crop subsidies and loans. But, over the decades, rural districts went R-Party--but of course, embraced prgrams that brought lard into their districts. Today, rural states get back $1.50 or so for every dollar sent to DC. A state like Kentucky is hooked on federal dope.
The R-Party of the 1930-50s was very fiscally conservative, often even aggressively cutting defense budgets (the R-Party largely wanted to sit out of WWII). As late as 1952 some R-Party stalwarts suggested eliminating the US Navy, due to the perceived power of the Air Force and the A-bomb.
But times have changed. Now the R-Party is a fervent supporter of rural lard and runaway defense spending, as it rewards campaign contributors and brings federal dope and lard into their districts.
"But times have changed. Now the R-Party is a fervent supporter of rural lard and runaway defense spending, as it rewards campaign contributors and brings federal dope and lard into their districts."
Unfortunately, that is a very valid point.
"But times have changed. Now the R-Party is a fervent supporter of rural lard and runaway defense spending, as it rewards campaign contributors and brings federal dope and lard into their districts."
You gotta love how Benji attacks the GOP as the fiscally reckless ones even while they are attempting to rein in his boyfriend's staggering spending spree at this very moment.
AIG,
I agree with Benji there are some bad Republicans. But there are no good Democrats. He paints rural America completely red, yet there are scores of tax-and-spend Democrats in the heartland he always forgets to mention, or perhaps he simply doesn't know about Tom Harkin, Dick Durbin, or the fact that his boyfriend was one of the biggest ethanol whores in the Senate during his part-time stint. In fact, there are Wisconsin Democrats hiding out in Illinois right now in order to obstruct Gov Walker's attempts to rein in the public sector parasites who bankroll the Democrat party. His boyfriend's apparatchiks at Organizing for America are directing the protests community organizer style.
But Benji just reposts the same gibberish over and over again.
benji-
commodities do not get cheaper in the long run either.
i notice that you have provided no data at all to back up your claims.
the CRB was 100 in 1970, it's 663 today.
that's 553% inflation, averaging 5% a year for the last 40 years.
so where is this long term commodity price decline you describe?
data please.
ps.
you have my name backwards.
unlike you, i have no desire to hide it.
"AIG,
I agree with Benji there are some bad Republicans. But there are no good Democrats."
I can agree with him on his point, and at the same time agree completely with your point here.
"boy, it's getting tough to find something to eat with my eggs."
Well, I see that one of your favorite dishes is still available at reasonable prices.
ron-
if i recall my monthy python correctly, it's:
spam, spam, spam, eggs, and spam.
that said, take a look at that price.
$37 for 6 cans = $6.16 per can or $8.22 a pound.
that looks quite expensive to me, particularly for somersetting that tastes like a 12 year old wrestling mat.
this article claims that spam was $3 a can in 2006.
http://caps.fool.com/blogs/have-you-seen-the-price-of/113943
if that is true, spam prices have more than doubled in 4 years, implying 19% inflation over that period.
maybe i'll just have the eggs.
"if that is true, spam prices have more than doubled in 4 years, implying 19% inflation over that period."
The horrors!! Maybe they're running out of the pigeons they make the stuff from?
Actually at my local supermarket a 6-pack of 12 ounce cans costs $20...or $3.3 per can. And thats Spam with CHEESE! :p So actually no inflation there.
This would be an incredible waste of time, if it weren't so funny.
"This would be an incredible waste of time, if it weren't so funny."
What would?
"What would?"
Continuing the discussion along the lines of "lets pick a food item, a clothing item etc, pretend like we are talking about nominal prices, and then proceed to say how much poorer in quality/worser with time things have gotten"
If this sort of argumentation was interesting, everyone would be fascinated by the stories their grandpa talks about.
"Continuing the discussion along the lines of "lets pick a food item, a clothing item etc..."
Hmm. I notice you are still following the thread...
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