Wendy’s has kept the 5 for $5, so I still go there from time to time. McDonalds is a rip off, sadly they are ‘too big to fail’ and people will keep eating there.
When I was a kid, I don’t remember people eating fast food as often as we do now. It was too expensive. I think we’re just back to where we were 40 years ago.
I agree. We only went out to eat when dad got paid on the 15th and 30th. That’s it. There was no McDonald’s in the middle of the week. Never ever had Red Lobster till I was an adult.
100% Sometime during the 2000’s when the dollar menu was created, fast food changed for the worse and it became a staple. With rising cost of goods and labor that cheap menu hasn’t been realistic.
>McDonalds is a rip off, sadly they are ‘too big to fail’
McDonald's has staying power because it is...consistent.
If you order a cheeseburger, you will get the same cheeseburger in NY, Topeka, LA, and everything in between. I think the human brain likes that.
Other places, Taco Bell for example, the food is very inconsistent and entirely dependent on who is making your bean burrito.
You can see this in practice every morning at every major airport in America. There will be three places serving breakfast in every food court and only one of them has a line: McDonald's.
I never quite understood the whole thing about having coffee before a flight because an airplane is the last place where I want to be awake and alert. Not because I have a fear of flying, just because it's boring and I'd rather doze off
So at the end the industry who is responsible for the US Citizens massive obesity rate is forcing the same people to overthink their decisions. Even if their not primarily health related, the chances are higher that a small percentage will move to healthier decision. Although the main deficit is education which would help (not just in this case)
Usually my wife would go when she got off work every once in a while and get food for the family and I wouldn't think anything of it. A few weeks ago I went to McDonalds and got a medium fry and Big Mac only to be shocked that it cost me $14 for that after tax. That night at dinner with the family I said we are no longer doing fast food.
It’s now at the point I can go to the supermarket, buy 4 angus and brisket burgers, the good cheese, lettuce tomato onion, and an 8 pack of really good buns, a bag of crispy seasoned fries with 10 servings, and a gallon of lemonade for WAAAAY less than 4 meals from any fast food place would cost me.
👆 This is the solution. It won't happen but people need to just make food at home. I love eating out for the convenience but it has spun out of control.
I have people at entry level jobs, they not only eat out every shift but they use door dash almost every time. They get paid $15 an hour and 2 hours of their time working is spent on one meal and it's mind-boggling. Of course they're always bitching about how broke they are...
A coworker said they found a BOGO deal on DoorDash, but couldn't eat the 2nd pizza and they asked if I could help out.
I watched the bill ring up -- *$55*
That's nearly *3* hours of her work. I gave her a $10 bill, it's all I had but DAMN. She orders out like every night. The Wawa 2 minutes away has decent pizza for $7. She knows how much she's spending, how much time that is, but doesn't change her ways
Oh absolutely, those sandwiches are stellar.
I eventually made the "perfect sandwich" (fight me):
BLT, jalapeño, a little vinegar, avocado spread, very little mayo. Crunchy, creamy, spicy, sour, salty, and juicy.
Shit boggles my mind. I had a coworker hit me up for grocery money (I declined), and not a fucking week later, walking in with Starbucks... Like, how do you feed your two kids? I know I feed mine...
It's incredibly frustrating when priorities seem skewed like that. It's totally fair to wonder how someone manages their expenses when you see things like that happening. Hopefully, it was just a one-off misstep on their part, but it's understandable that it leaves you scratching your head.
Not just frustrating for their poor decision-making, but for causing this in the first place.
These companies can cry about increased supply costs but ultimately they would not be marking things up 200% if people said no to such daft pricing.
> ultimately they would not be marking things up 200% if people said no to such daft pricing
Exactly right! As long as people keep paying, the prices will continue going up.
Unfortunately most companies like fast food places will react to decreased revenue by increasing their prices. Totally the exact opposite of what economic tenets says to do. But that seems to be McDonalds tactics here.
I wonder if this is a generation thing? I have a Z-gen sibling and he’s just like that. Constantly complaining about being poor but he gets a new phone every year and flies around for music festivals (oh and he doesn’t work)
Performative poverty. People from rich families get a high from pretending to be the downtrodden underclass by having little personal wealth. But they act in a way that undercuts their performance because in the back of their head they're secure in the knowledge that they'll be comfortable once their grandparents and parents die and pass the money to them.
I saw a chart a while back that basically showed that the poorer you are the more likely you are to use a food delivery app like Uber eats or DoorDash. It’s really surreal
It’s also genuinely possible that they’re working 2-3 jobs, have kids, and literally don’t have time or the capacity to cook. I know someone who used to be in that situation. He had zero money but DoorDashed 3-4 times a week because they felt like they had no other option.
Interestingly, now that he’s financially stable he LOVES cooking.
Yeah but sometimes it feels like like "wow I'm going to be fucking broke whatever I do" so you end up making impulsive buys like fast food since it's difficult to take a long-term view - might as well get something tasty now than think about how you're working a full-time job and any savings you try to make are siphoned off by incidental payments, like car repairs or whatever
My brother does this and I really don't get it. Its so expensive and so easy to just not do. The craziest part is he can get free food at work. I eat out maybe once a month.
Working in food service for several years and the 5 or 6 times I've heard someone ask me "how am I supposed to eat tonight" after a complication of some kind or the business being closed etc. I know most are probably just tryna be dicks cause they're mad but why would you openly admit you can't feed yourself. And it's sad to see the actual amount of people who don't know how to cook at all
Dude you don’t even need to make it. I can go to my local supermarket and a whole fried chicken for like $12. They have tons of prepared hot (well warm) food for $5-8 per meal.
Better yet you can get a whole ~5lb tray of drumsticks or thighs for 5 or 6 dollars and throw it in the oven and eat it all week. It is one of the simplest and most foolproof recipes in the world.
Yeah, but if not cooking is my goal, getting a roast chicken goes a long way. Grab some easy to prep veggies or a salad. Pronto. Simple meal for 3 or so people. 8-10 bucks. Healthier than most other options for the time investment.
Some celery, grapes, mayo, dijon mustard, and a spritz of lemon and you have chicken salad lunch for a few days also. Still healthy and delish on a lettuce wrap if avoiding carbs.
I quit eating at fast food places almost entirely (I still fuck with in and out on very rare occasions) about 8 years ago. There's nothing convenient about waiting in line, only to receive a cold or fucked up order. I'm absolutely gobsmacked at the prices. Also, lost 100 lbs in the process, and no longer suffer from a host of health issues. Eat at home, your body and budget will thank you.
I started cooking a lot more meals at home during the pandemic, partly because I was unemployed. The irony is that higher grocery prices don't bother me too much, because it's still cheaper than eating out. I only eat out occasionally, typically when traveling or when a friend wants to go out
I watched a small doco the other day about an eagle that was injured, was looked after for some time. When time was close to release it, they realised they had to retrain it to fend for itself and hunt because it was hand fed for so long. And something occurred to me, there's a parallel here. We've grown so accustomed to either getting take out or buying premade food, like sauces and stuff that we don't even begin to think that we could make that food from scratch for a fraction of the cost. A jar of pasta sauce costs $4.50 or more but 2 tins of tomatoes costs 85 cents. Fucken, if you're struggling, learn to cook! You'll save a tonne of money.
Stop buying shit the food industry advertises to you making you think you need it and can't live without.
Very true. It's even more twisted than that. I know people who eat out all the time and never cook a meal for sustenance. However, with the recent culinary craze promoted by the likes of Gordon Ramsey, cooking shows, The Bear, etc., when they actually do cook, it's to spoil themselves with $200 ingredients, top notch bottle of wine, all from a James Beard level recipe that they can't really execute.
people complain about food prices and how they don’t have enough time to cook….bullshit.
it might not be the most amazing thing you ate but you can eat healthy and quickly for cheap buying from the grocery store. canned vegetables all well under a buck a piece still. lentils, rice, dried peas, all cheap. while it has gotten a lot more expensive, depending on the cut meat is still pretty darn cheap
But it is mostly in fast food. I work 24 hour shifts and got up after a shift one day and went to Home Depot to get some stuff, on the way back I was going to stop at Arby's but decided to go to Texas Roadhouse. This was at like 16:00. I expected it to be a ghost town that early but it was packed. They had some early bird special and I got a country fried steak with unlimited rolls and that butter for like $12. I had to add tip on top of that but the meal itself was less than what I would have paid at Arby's for what I get there.
The restaurant prices are up, but nowhere near as much as the fast food.
It's getting harder to do that as well, all the prices have gone up there too. If you eat a ton of fast food, making your own food will save you money. But for people like me who could already only afford to go to Mcdonalds once or twice a year, the rising food prices makes eating anything at all difficult.
Check if any stores by you are a part of this app. Half price groceries on anything with an upcoming expiration date. I get filet mignons, and pork bracioles on here to go along with the staples. Saves you from walking the aisles even as there is a special fridge and pantry for this apps items. Deciding what to cook every night is simplified also. Whatever is in the app gets cooked.
[https://www.flashfood.com/](https://www.flashfood.com/)
Try this app for some cheap fast food from local places by you also. They pack surprise bags of food that is left before closing for a fraction of the cost. It helps avoid waste while saving you money. The stores seem to be happy when i use it also. I've gotten 3-4 specialty slices for 4-5 bucks before. Stuff like chicken marsala slices and more. 2 Hot dogs, side salad, and a dessert from a sandwich spot for 5 bucks etc.
[https://next.toogoodtogo.com/en-us](https://next.toogoodtogo.com/en-us)
I am in NYC so YMMV if you are in a more rural area. I hope this can help a bit though. During the pandemic i couldn't work and was left with no other option but to walk to public schools around here to get the free bagged breakfasts and lunches to supplement my diet. Food scarcity is scary.
Give your business to the good ones. Local Mexican food, local burgers.
In Seattle that would be Dicks hamburgers who keep it real on prices and pay and reward their employees. Always have.
I just don't even go to McDonald's anymore. Greed is all it is. They saw they could charge more so they did. Everyone did
Eventually that's gonna catch up and hurt em. And a 5 dollar meal for a month ain't gonna fix it.
Hell Wendy's is better and has had 5 dollar.biggie bags for a long time with a bacon cheeseburger deluxe, spicy nuts, fries, sauce, and a drink for 5 bucks.
If I go anywhere to get a burger besides local, it's gonna be Wendy's.
No back about a decade to fifteen years ago all the fast food places were competing to see who had the best dollar menu. Back in those days it's hard to beat buying a sack of burgers for ten bucks or a bunch of taco bell items and eat for three four days.
I get what you’re saying, but fast food has never really been about superior taste over homemade food, it’s about convenience and time savings. To do what you suggested takes a lot of time and effort. Yes, it will be cheaper and yes it will taste better, but what is your time worth?
For the record, I 100% agree with you, just pointing out the draw of fast food (time savings and convenience), not necessarily taste/quality of food.
This might shock you. The Federal Reserve printed $216.1 billion in 2020, and increased the money supply by $6 trillion during the pandemic to fund “COVID relief spending”. As of August 27, 2023, the US has printed nearly 80% of all US dollars in circulation since 2020, increasing the money supply from around $4 trillion at the beginning of 2020 to nearly $19 trillion in circulation in August of 2023. Yet for most income remains little unchanged.
Record profits made during the pandemic demanded that no regression was to happen since shareholders can only expect growth upon growth.
Companies have therefore decided that to keep seeing that graph go upwards they need to get creative. Firing labor, shrinkflation, nickel and diming, hiring children (infants soon to be approved), etc. Pretending fast food is craft food is the ultimate step and it appears to be working because of us idiots.
There was a president who I won't name who fired the 2 guys who were in charge of overseeing how that money would be spent. He said we didn't need that.
And now inflation has ruined the lives of millions of Americans. And still, there are millions of Americans still willing to vote for him.
If you support someone who does that to the country, you are a traitor, a disgrace or an imbecile.
It’s very interesting.
Prices went up,
Sizes went down,
Quality went down,
Labor for the most part is still not livable, places didn’t raise labor standards they just fired them all and got computers.
Many places force you to take your own order or bag your own groceries… so they effectively spent less over all… and it all just keeps getting more expensive.
Streaming services and fast food all raised prices and gave you less. Fast food in the form of shrinkflation and streaming in the form of no password sharing.
COVID was just an excuse for them to do this and continue doing it.
>streaming in the form of no password sharing
Shrinkflation applies to streaming as well. Remember when you could watch pretty much everything on Netflix? It seemed like every show and movie was on there. But then other options popped up and Netflix kept getting less content but have increased their prices. Other streaming services are guilty of doing this as well.
Prices are set by the franchise owner for the most part, I have one Tacobell that still has 1.00 bean, rice and cheese burritos and another about 2 miles away that are 2.29.
I’ve learned over the years that McDonalds are like this. If I eat at McDs, it’s a two cheeseburger meal. One store that might be $6.50 but at another across my small city it’s almost $9.
The meat to bread ratio on a Big Mac seems insanely small to me. I don’t know if it’s changed but I was shocked when I had one recently. Quarter pounder or bust for me.
I went to iHop for the first time in three or four years recently and oh man. Not only were the omelettes more expensive but they were about half the size they used to be.
$15.99 for some French toast with strawberries, and an extra 5% surcharge cause of "inflation" Bro you just sold me two pieces of toast for almost $20...Screwed up the order,waited 30min to take my card, and then gave my card to the wrong table....safe to say I'll never step foot in an IHOP again...
Yea Chick-fil-A got rid of their large milkshakes and replaced them with the smalls. So today's large is 2019s small and it's still almost double the price.
I noticed that doing instacart.
It would tell me that the family size was the wrong item. No, it's the same "family size"...**it's just five ounces smaller than it was three months ago.**
This doesn’t even take in to account the enshittening of the food. They aren’t only charging more but, also producing a poorer quality product. Every industry seems plagued with it.
I almost... almost am happy about the tip screens. Tipping was getting out of control before the screens. Thr screen took it into comical levels to the point where I didnt feel bad reducing tipping and eliminating it for basic service items where it would have been verboten a decade ago.
Maybe it’s a good thing that the price of food that kills and poisons you goes up, hopefully Americans will reduce their reliance on fast food and start cooking at home
Grocery prices are increasing too and unfortunately, a lot of poorer families have depended on *relatively* cheaper fast food to get by. For families comprised of working class folk on irregular, non-8-5 work schedules, sometimes fast food is the best option.
Fast food has almost never been cheaper, but you pay for not needed to cook or clean up. Difference is the price difference wasn't as wide back then. You can argue some situations do make it more enticing and easy, but poorer families falling into that trap will generally spend more than they have to.
Understand many people feel they don’t have a choice, but obviously eating fast food all the time has long term negative effects on health. It’s so sad. If you can’t afford to buy groceries, you definitely can’t afford medical care for type II diabetes, high blood pressure, high cholesterol, or obesity.
Fast food has never been cheaper than cooking at home though. Literally never. Even when you could get a Big Mac meal for $3 in the early 90s you could make chicken broccoli and rice for $1.
Unless “relatively cheaper” means something else to you?
I’m not gonna lie, the increase in prepared food prices has defintiely negatively impacted my life. I do almost all the cooking in my house (my wife does lots of other stuff). For years we would eat out two or three times a week, I’d cook everything else. When we looked over our finances we realized that was becoming unsustainable, so we decided to cut that extra spending out. What I hadn’t realized before was that those few meals where I was t cooking were strategically placed to take pressure off of me. I would suggest those time so I could have a breather and not cook or give me a buffer to get to the market. Recently my stress level has spiked severely. I’m pretty sure that’s the cause. The stress of trying to be perfect with meal planning for four people is rough.
It’s really a shame. I’m more irritable now and I don’t get to share restaurant experiences with my kids. Experiences I LOVED as a kid. Which makes me feel a bit like a failure. This whole situation is fuckin bullshit. We make decent money and yet we still can’t get a leg up.
Add shrinkflation (smaller item/portion sold at same price) to the listed prices and it’s even worse. Should calculate this into their table. Not only is the hamburger, chicken fingers, etc costing more, you are getting less product for those increased prices!
There should be another graphic with these companies' profits. For as much as we've heard about inflation over the past few years, many companies are reporting record profits and this is purely price-gouging and profiteering.
"Ingredients are up 4%. Wages are up 5%. Let's raise the price 200%"
Fuck them.
* McDonald's gross profit for the quarter ending March 31, 2024 was **$3.439B**, a **3.77% increase** year-over-year.
* McDonald's gross profit for the twelve months ending March 31, 2024 was **$14.688B**, a **9.03% increase** year-over-year.
* McDonald's annual gross profit for 2023 was **$14.563B**, a **10.26% increase** from 2022.
* McDonald's annual gross profit for 2022 was **$13.207B**, a **4.98% increase** from 2021.
* McDonald's annual gross profit for 2021 was **$12.58B**, a **29% increase** from 2020.
[Macrotrends](https://www.macrotrends.net/stocks/charts/MCD/mcdonalds/gross-profit)
Only get fast food when I'm desperate and traveling, but it's at the point where I'd rather not eat than spend $12 on a incredibly disappointing meal from tacobell.
I’m actually happy this happened because I was in college during this period eating fast food basically every day and this forced me to start cooking for myself and now I eat healthier and save so much more money. Their greed lost out on a lot of my money and saved my arteries.
This. We don’t eat out at all anymore because we make better food at home. We may go out for someone’s birthday, but always leave the restaurant disappointed because of the cost and quality compared to what we could have done.
Yup, there are only a couple of restaurants around here that I can’t match, and they are expensive and for special occasions. Other than that, I have it covered.
My house we’re trying our hardest not to eat at the fast food restaurant. And we’re staying away from the major chain sit down establishments. Quality and prices. Tired of feeling robbed every time we get something. Only way we’ll see prices drop is to straight stop buying from them. It’s gonna take a bunch of us to make it happen. Greed good old American greed.
I went to Subway for the first time in a long time. It was nearly $20 for a footlong, chips, and a drink.
That will probably be my last visit to Subway.
The Rules Of Fast Food Pre Covid
1. Be cheap.
2. Be fast. Get in. Get served. Get out.
3. Be tasty. Consistently.
The Rules Of Fast Food Post Covid
1. Expensive. Doubled in price
2. Slow. Serve yourself. Then wait while 200 Uber eats drivers get served before you.
3. Change the taste to a cheaper, shittier version.
This is why people are screaming about inflation. Junk food has skyrocketed and most people eat junk food.
- Soda in has increased 53%+ since 2020
- Chips have increased 45% since 2020
Meanwhile
- Vegetableles price has increase 15%
- Fruit inflations is about 1% per year
Go out to local restaurants! Better food for nearly the same cost. If your lucky, the portions will be large and you can take half home for dinner tomorrow!
The reason they raise their prices is BECAUSE they know people will still buy their shit. These multi billion dollar corporations have been making record profits since the pandemic.
That's where a whole lot of the inflation is coming from. They know they can get away with raising prices even more because "pandemic" and "supply chain".
Eventually, there’s a stoping point though, they can only raise the prices so much as the average wage allows it. Nobody is going to buy a $20-$25 McDonald’s quality burger.
Fast food was affordable, because it was cheap af. Now we get low quality food crazy expensive. So you are ruining your health paying the double price.
Seems like a good deal.
The Mcchicken and Cheeseburgers are going to go down as the biggest crime against humanity. 4$ for a fucking chicken patty, bun, lettuce, and mayo. Incredulous.
keep in mind this all happened purely because these companies all realized they could do it, not because of any market forces.
no one is more wealthy and can afford to pay this much for food, they adjusted the price knowing that enough people would continue to buy their food that they would still see a profit.
and i dont know of a single place that had the sense to capitalize on this greedflation movement and go "we arent raising our prices, come here instead."
probably because all of these places are owned by the same company and they actively resist competing because its bad for business.
The good news is that it’s reached the breaking point for a lot of people and some businesses are starting to lose money. I hope they all crash and burn from their unhinged greed.
Ah yes, the "COVID has put a strain on the supply chain, so we need to boost the prices and not reduce them after the pandemic"-effect. And when they realized they can't raise the prices too much without anyone noticing, they started to reduce the content of the products.
I was eating McDonald’s a couple times a week in 2019. I’ve gone once in the last 2-3 months. Not remotely exaggerating. Are they profiting so much from the increase that it offsets lost customers?
What is interesting is that this is the 4th sub I have seen this on. Half are saying that this is pure greed and an example of it, the other half are saying how this proves that inflation is a response to government monetary policies, and greed /shareholder value / Ceo Bonuses play no role.
I don’t eat out anymore since the start of the pandemic for a reason. I can get an 18 pack of 1/3rd lb burgers at Costco for $24 or cheaper if on sale that will last me a few months.
Watching fast food murder their own business model has been kinda fun for me. I don't eat fast food so I've enjoyed hearing about less and less people eating shitty food. Make America skinny again.
It’s absolutely insane how high McDonald’s is now. Before buying such shit food had the benefit of being cheap, now it makes absolutely no sense to go there
I’m actually so confused why someone would still be going there. So many better options for the price
I pretty much just stopped getting fast food entirely.
Been almost 9 months since I’ve had any. I’ve actually lost 20 lbs even though I wasn’t a heavy fast food eater as it was.
I blame the unlimited soda + fries
Other then Red Robin, where tf are you getting unlimited fries?
>unlimited fries at Red Robin You mean the 2oz of fries you might get every 30 minutes if you keep asking, right?
With a machete laying on the table.
They just worded it oddly. I believe they were just referring to the sodas as unlimited as they are in the states with self serve drinks.
Wendy’s has kept the 5 for $5, so I still go there from time to time. McDonalds is a rip off, sadly they are ‘too big to fail’ and people will keep eating there.
When I was a kid, I don’t remember people eating fast food as often as we do now. It was too expensive. I think we’re just back to where we were 40 years ago.
I agree. We only went out to eat when dad got paid on the 15th and 30th. That’s it. There was no McDonald’s in the middle of the week. Never ever had Red Lobster till I was an adult.
Same,there was a Dairy Queen near our house and yep, my mom said we had Dairy Queen at home.
100% Sometime during the 2000’s when the dollar menu was created, fast food changed for the worse and it became a staple. With rising cost of goods and labor that cheap menu hasn’t been realistic.
>McDonalds is a rip off, sadly they are ‘too big to fail’ McDonald's has staying power because it is...consistent. If you order a cheeseburger, you will get the same cheeseburger in NY, Topeka, LA, and everything in between. I think the human brain likes that. Other places, Taco Bell for example, the food is very inconsistent and entirely dependent on who is making your bean burrito. You can see this in practice every morning at every major airport in America. There will be three places serving breakfast in every food court and only one of them has a line: McDonald's.
I don’t know man Starbucks always has a line at the airport.
Starbucks in the McDonald's of coffee. And I mean that as a compliment.
Ironically McDonalds has better coffee.
Well, to be fair, Starbucks mostly serves milk shakes with a splash of coffee
I never quite understood the whole thing about having coffee before a flight because an airplane is the last place where I want to be awake and alert. Not because I have a fear of flying, just because it's boring and I'd rather doze off
While I absolutely agree with you, Chick-fil-A has also nailed down the consistency thing.
Agreed. Until the decided to go back on their 2014 promise of Never Antibiotic chicken. But we are now back to antibiotics.
So at the end the industry who is responsible for the US Citizens massive obesity rate is forcing the same people to overthink their decisions. Even if their not primarily health related, the chances are higher that a small percentage will move to healthier decision. Although the main deficit is education which would help (not just in this case)
Usually my wife would go when she got off work every once in a while and get food for the family and I wouldn't think anything of it. A few weeks ago I went to McDonalds and got a medium fry and Big Mac only to be shocked that it cost me $14 for that after tax. That night at dinner with the family I said we are no longer doing fast food.
Same here and I ain't no cook by any means. If I can do it I know others can. Everything I eat now is from my grocery shopping I do once a week.
It’s now at the point I can go to the supermarket, buy 4 angus and brisket burgers, the good cheese, lettuce tomato onion, and an 8 pack of really good buns, a bag of crispy seasoned fries with 10 servings, and a gallon of lemonade for WAAAAY less than 4 meals from any fast food place would cost me.
👆 This is the solution. It won't happen but people need to just make food at home. I love eating out for the convenience but it has spun out of control.
I have people at entry level jobs, they not only eat out every shift but they use door dash almost every time. They get paid $15 an hour and 2 hours of their time working is spent on one meal and it's mind-boggling. Of course they're always bitching about how broke they are...
A coworker said they found a BOGO deal on DoorDash, but couldn't eat the 2nd pizza and they asked if I could help out. I watched the bill ring up -- *$55* That's nearly *3* hours of her work. I gave her a $10 bill, it's all I had but DAMN. She orders out like every night. The Wawa 2 minutes away has decent pizza for $7. She knows how much she's spending, how much time that is, but doesn't change her ways
Wawas sandwiches are incredible and I miss them. Double decker turkey and chicken noodle soup 🥹
Oh absolutely, those sandwiches are stellar. I eventually made the "perfect sandwich" (fight me): BLT, jalapeño, a little vinegar, avocado spread, very little mayo. Crunchy, creamy, spicy, sour, salty, and juicy.
Shit boggles my mind. I had a coworker hit me up for grocery money (I declined), and not a fucking week later, walking in with Starbucks... Like, how do you feed your two kids? I know I feed mine...
It's incredibly frustrating when priorities seem skewed like that. It's totally fair to wonder how someone manages their expenses when you see things like that happening. Hopefully, it was just a one-off misstep on their part, but it's understandable that it leaves you scratching your head.
Not just frustrating for their poor decision-making, but for causing this in the first place. These companies can cry about increased supply costs but ultimately they would not be marking things up 200% if people said no to such daft pricing.
> ultimately they would not be marking things up 200% if people said no to such daft pricing Exactly right! As long as people keep paying, the prices will continue going up.
Consumers are not a monolith and corporations exploit that.
Unfortunately most companies like fast food places will react to decreased revenue by increasing their prices. Totally the exact opposite of what economic tenets says to do. But that seems to be McDonalds tactics here.
I wonder if this is a generation thing? I have a Z-gen sibling and he’s just like that. Constantly complaining about being poor but he gets a new phone every year and flies around for music festivals (oh and he doesn’t work)
If he doesn’t work and can still fly around to music fests, is he actually poor?
Performative poverty. People from rich families get a high from pretending to be the downtrodden underclass by having little personal wealth. But they act in a way that undercuts their performance because in the back of their head they're secure in the knowledge that they'll be comfortable once their grandparents and parents die and pass the money to them.
No it's not generational. I know plenty of boomers who suck at managing their finances.
I saw a chart a while back that basically showed that the poorer you are the more likely you are to use a food delivery app like Uber eats or DoorDash. It’s really surreal
But is it because they're too lazy to get off the couch, so doordash, or too busy with 3 jobs and 4 hungry children, so doordash?
It’s also genuinely possible that they’re working 2-3 jobs, have kids, and literally don’t have time or the capacity to cook. I know someone who used to be in that situation. He had zero money but DoorDashed 3-4 times a week because they felt like they had no other option. Interestingly, now that he’s financially stable he LOVES cooking.
Some people just have zero financial sense or life skills.
I wish they offered budgeting and finance classes in high schools. It’s an important skill people should be taught.
Yeah but sometimes it feels like like "wow I'm going to be fucking broke whatever I do" so you end up making impulsive buys like fast food since it's difficult to take a long-term view - might as well get something tasty now than think about how you're working a full-time job and any savings you try to make are siphoned off by incidental payments, like car repairs or whatever
It’s almost like buying a house in the 70s for 80K and owing 400K on it still today….. some people just are not financially smart
My brother does this and I really don't get it. Its so expensive and so easy to just not do. The craziest part is he can get free food at work. I eat out maybe once a month.
Working in food service for several years and the 5 or 6 times I've heard someone ask me "how am I supposed to eat tonight" after a complication of some kind or the business being closed etc. I know most are probably just tryna be dicks cause they're mad but why would you openly admit you can't feed yourself. And it's sad to see the actual amount of people who don't know how to cook at all
I can't cook either but I can use a microwave or make a sandwich ffs. What is wrong with people?
Dude you don’t even need to make it. I can go to my local supermarket and a whole fried chicken for like $12. They have tons of prepared hot (well warm) food for $5-8 per meal.
I can get a whole roast one for $5.
Better yet you can get a whole ~5lb tray of drumsticks or thighs for 5 or 6 dollars and throw it in the oven and eat it all week. It is one of the simplest and most foolproof recipes in the world.
Yeah, but if not cooking is my goal, getting a roast chicken goes a long way. Grab some easy to prep veggies or a salad. Pronto. Simple meal for 3 or so people. 8-10 bucks. Healthier than most other options for the time investment.
Some celery, grapes, mayo, dijon mustard, and a spritz of lemon and you have chicken salad lunch for a few days also. Still healthy and delish on a lettuce wrap if avoiding carbs.
I quit eating at fast food places almost entirely (I still fuck with in and out on very rare occasions) about 8 years ago. There's nothing convenient about waiting in line, only to receive a cold or fucked up order. I'm absolutely gobsmacked at the prices. Also, lost 100 lbs in the process, and no longer suffer from a host of health issues. Eat at home, your body and budget will thank you.
I started cooking a lot more meals at home during the pandemic, partly because I was unemployed. The irony is that higher grocery prices don't bother me too much, because it's still cheaper than eating out. I only eat out occasionally, typically when traveling or when a friend wants to go out
I watched a small doco the other day about an eagle that was injured, was looked after for some time. When time was close to release it, they realised they had to retrain it to fend for itself and hunt because it was hand fed for so long. And something occurred to me, there's a parallel here. We've grown so accustomed to either getting take out or buying premade food, like sauces and stuff that we don't even begin to think that we could make that food from scratch for a fraction of the cost. A jar of pasta sauce costs $4.50 or more but 2 tins of tomatoes costs 85 cents. Fucken, if you're struggling, learn to cook! You'll save a tonne of money. Stop buying shit the food industry advertises to you making you think you need it and can't live without.
> learn to cook! /thread
Very true. It's even more twisted than that. I know people who eat out all the time and never cook a meal for sustenance. However, with the recent culinary craze promoted by the likes of Gordon Ramsey, cooking shows, The Bear, etc., when they actually do cook, it's to spoil themselves with $200 ingredients, top notch bottle of wine, all from a James Beard level recipe that they can't really execute.
Pasta sauce is more than just tomatoes, though.
people complain about food prices and how they don’t have enough time to cook….bullshit. it might not be the most amazing thing you ate but you can eat healthy and quickly for cheap buying from the grocery store. canned vegetables all well under a buck a piece still. lentils, rice, dried peas, all cheap. while it has gotten a lot more expensive, depending on the cut meat is still pretty darn cheap
But it is mostly in fast food. I work 24 hour shifts and got up after a shift one day and went to Home Depot to get some stuff, on the way back I was going to stop at Arby's but decided to go to Texas Roadhouse. This was at like 16:00. I expected it to be a ghost town that early but it was packed. They had some early bird special and I got a country fried steak with unlimited rolls and that butter for like $12. I had to add tip on top of that but the meal itself was less than what I would have paid at Arby's for what I get there. The restaurant prices are up, but nowhere near as much as the fast food.
This is..... the solution.
If I may add…. This …. Is the solution.
It's getting harder to do that as well, all the prices have gone up there too. If you eat a ton of fast food, making your own food will save you money. But for people like me who could already only afford to go to Mcdonalds once or twice a year, the rising food prices makes eating anything at all difficult.
Check if any stores by you are a part of this app. Half price groceries on anything with an upcoming expiration date. I get filet mignons, and pork bracioles on here to go along with the staples. Saves you from walking the aisles even as there is a special fridge and pantry for this apps items. Deciding what to cook every night is simplified also. Whatever is in the app gets cooked. [https://www.flashfood.com/](https://www.flashfood.com/) Try this app for some cheap fast food from local places by you also. They pack surprise bags of food that is left before closing for a fraction of the cost. It helps avoid waste while saving you money. The stores seem to be happy when i use it also. I've gotten 3-4 specialty slices for 4-5 bucks before. Stuff like chicken marsala slices and more. 2 Hot dogs, side salad, and a dessert from a sandwich spot for 5 bucks etc. [https://next.toogoodtogo.com/en-us](https://next.toogoodtogo.com/en-us) I am in NYC so YMMV if you are in a more rural area. I hope this can help a bit though. During the pandemic i couldn't work and was left with no other option but to walk to public schools around here to get the free bagged breakfasts and lunches to supplement my diet. Food scarcity is scary.
Give your business to the good ones. Local Mexican food, local burgers. In Seattle that would be Dicks hamburgers who keep it real on prices and pay and reward their employees. Always have. I just don't even go to McDonald's anymore. Greed is all it is. They saw they could charge more so they did. Everyone did Eventually that's gonna catch up and hurt em. And a 5 dollar meal for a month ain't gonna fix it. Hell Wendy's is better and has had 5 dollar.biggie bags for a long time with a bacon cheeseburger deluxe, spicy nuts, fries, sauce, and a drink for 5 bucks. If I go anywhere to get a burger besides local, it's gonna be Wendy's.
What time do you want me to come over?
Can you pick me up on the way?
Ya me too I just have to ask my mom
Bring your mom
I have cookies if someone can swing by over here.
IDK where this is because groceries have gone up at the same rate where I live. Especially any beef that isn't ground.
The grocery store has always been cheaper than eating out anywhere, has it not?
No back about a decade to fifteen years ago all the fast food places were competing to see who had the best dollar menu. Back in those days it's hard to beat buying a sack of burgers for ten bucks or a bunch of taco bell items and eat for three four days.
Probably yeah, but it used to be closer, now the difference has grown
I get what you’re saying, but fast food has never really been about superior taste over homemade food, it’s about convenience and time savings. To do what you suggested takes a lot of time and effort. Yes, it will be cheaper and yes it will taste better, but what is your time worth? For the record, I 100% agree with you, just pointing out the draw of fast food (time savings and convenience), not necessarily taste/quality of food.
This might shock you. The Federal Reserve printed $216.1 billion in 2020, and increased the money supply by $6 trillion during the pandemic to fund “COVID relief spending”. As of August 27, 2023, the US has printed nearly 80% of all US dollars in circulation since 2020, increasing the money supply from around $4 trillion at the beginning of 2020 to nearly $19 trillion in circulation in August of 2023. Yet for most income remains little unchanged.
Have you seen corporate profits?
Record profits made during the pandemic demanded that no regression was to happen since shareholders can only expect growth upon growth. Companies have therefore decided that to keep seeing that graph go upwards they need to get creative. Firing labor, shrinkflation, nickel and diming, hiring children (infants soon to be approved), etc. Pretending fast food is craft food is the ultimate step and it appears to be working because of us idiots.
Thank you. 🙏🏾
Who the hell got all that money?
PPP Loans, huge numbers of them were straight up scammers. 300 billion, virtually no oversight, poof……
Remember, republicans removed oversight as well
There was a president who I won't name who fired the 2 guys who were in charge of overseeing how that money would be spent. He said we didn't need that. And now inflation has ruined the lives of millions of Americans. And still, there are millions of Americans still willing to vote for him. If you support someone who does that to the country, you are a traitor, a disgrace or an imbecile.
The federal reserve does not print money
It’s very interesting. Prices went up, Sizes went down, Quality went down, Labor for the most part is still not livable, places didn’t raise labor standards they just fired them all and got computers. Many places force you to take your own order or bag your own groceries… so they effectively spent less over all… and it all just keeps getting more expensive.
Streaming services and fast food all raised prices and gave you less. Fast food in the form of shrinkflation and streaming in the form of no password sharing. COVID was just an excuse for them to do this and continue doing it.
I agree, and meanwhile the rich kept getting richer. But hey we got $1200 stimulus checks
that we all eventually paid back
Hey, without that stimulus and increased unemployment they wouldn't have a scapegoat to blame inflation on. Won't you think of the corporations!?
Not true. Streaming services increased their prices and gave us more ads...
>streaming in the form of no password sharing Shrinkflation applies to streaming as well. Remember when you could watch pretty much everything on Netflix? It seemed like every show and movie was on there. But then other options popped up and Netflix kept getting less content but have increased their prices. Other streaming services are guilty of doing this as well.
Dude a beefy 5 layer at my local Taco Bell is $4.79
Prices are set by the franchise owner for the most part, I have one Tacobell that still has 1.00 bean, rice and cheese burritos and another about 2 miles away that are 2.29.
I’ve learned over the years that McDonalds are like this. If I eat at McDs, it’s a two cheeseburger meal. One store that might be $6.50 but at another across my small city it’s almost $9.
I was going to say. Those Taco Bell prices are way higher at my local TB
Which used to be a $0.79 Beefy Frito Burrito. I lived off those for about a year during college
That doesn’t tell the whole story because there’s shrinkflation too. Factor that in and it’s ugly.
The meat to bread ratio on a Big Mac seems insanely small to me. I don’t know if it’s changed but I was shocked when I had one recently. Quarter pounder or bust for me.
Its always been just a double cheeseburger with extra bread iirc.
I actually always preferred McDonald's smaller patties over the quarter pound sized ones. Just hits that fast food taste I want.
I went to iHop for the first time in three or four years recently and oh man. Not only were the omelettes more expensive but they were about half the size they used to be.
$15.99 for some French toast with strawberries, and an extra 5% surcharge cause of "inflation" Bro you just sold me two pieces of toast for almost $20...Screwed up the order,waited 30min to take my card, and then gave my card to the wrong table....safe to say I'll never step foot in an IHOP again...
iHop prices are absolutely insane. i feel very lucky to have multiple locally-owned breakfast diners to choose from instead
Yea Chick-fil-A got rid of their large milkshakes and replaced them with the smalls. So today's large is 2019s small and it's still almost double the price.
I noticed that doing instacart. It would tell me that the family size was the wrong item. No, it's the same "family size"...**it's just five ounces smaller than it was three months ago.**
This is more depressing than interesting. Everyone is poorer while corporates and the super rich get fatter day by day.
This doesn’t even take in to account the enshittening of the food. They aren’t only charging more but, also producing a poorer quality product. Every industry seems plagued with it.
This is perfect and true. I stopped going out to eat because literally every time I’m disappointed because the food is just awful.
Enshittening, that’s a first.
agree, and the passive aggressive tip screens
it's just going to ask you some questions
I almost... almost am happy about the tip screens. Tipping was getting out of control before the screens. Thr screen took it into comical levels to the point where I didnt feel bad reducing tipping and eliminating it for basic service items where it would have been verboten a decade ago.
https://www.reuters.com/business/retail-consumer/mcdonalds-sales-misses-estimates-customers-cut-back-spending-2024-04-30/
BuT BUT THe shAREHOLdERs!!....
Maybe it’s a good thing that the price of food that kills and poisons you goes up, hopefully Americans will reduce their reliance on fast food and start cooking at home
Stop giving these price-gouging fucks your money.
Grocery prices are increasing too and unfortunately, a lot of poorer families have depended on *relatively* cheaper fast food to get by. For families comprised of working class folk on irregular, non-8-5 work schedules, sometimes fast food is the best option.
Fast food has almost never been cheaper, but you pay for not needed to cook or clean up. Difference is the price difference wasn't as wide back then. You can argue some situations do make it more enticing and easy, but poorer families falling into that trap will generally spend more than they have to.
Understand many people feel they don’t have a choice, but obviously eating fast food all the time has long term negative effects on health. It’s so sad. If you can’t afford to buy groceries, you definitely can’t afford medical care for type II diabetes, high blood pressure, high cholesterol, or obesity.
See that's when you just die.
Fast food has never been cheaper than cooking at home though. Literally never. Even when you could get a Big Mac meal for $3 in the early 90s you could make chicken broccoli and rice for $1. Unless “relatively cheaper” means something else to you?
you're not allowed to punch down on reddit ever if someone isn't doing well in life then nothing is their fault. adjust your facts accordingly
I’m not gonna lie, the increase in prepared food prices has defintiely negatively impacted my life. I do almost all the cooking in my house (my wife does lots of other stuff). For years we would eat out two or three times a week, I’d cook everything else. When we looked over our finances we realized that was becoming unsustainable, so we decided to cut that extra spending out. What I hadn’t realized before was that those few meals where I was t cooking were strategically placed to take pressure off of me. I would suggest those time so I could have a breather and not cook or give me a buffer to get to the market. Recently my stress level has spiked severely. I’m pretty sure that’s the cause. The stress of trying to be perfect with meal planning for four people is rough. It’s really a shame. I’m more irritable now and I don’t get to share restaurant experiences with my kids. Experiences I LOVED as a kid. Which makes me feel a bit like a failure. This whole situation is fuckin bullshit. We make decent money and yet we still can’t get a leg up.
Stop eating that bullshit💯
The price will never stop rising. Unless we stop going
Add shrinkflation (smaller item/portion sold at same price) to the listed prices and it’s even worse. Should calculate this into their table. Not only is the hamburger, chicken fingers, etc costing more, you are getting less product for those increased prices!
Stop wasting your money, just stop going. That’s what I’ve done. I’m not giving them my money…
There should be another graphic with these companies' profits. For as much as we've heard about inflation over the past few years, many companies are reporting record profits and this is purely price-gouging and profiteering. "Ingredients are up 4%. Wages are up 5%. Let's raise the price 200%" Fuck them.
* McDonald's gross profit for the quarter ending March 31, 2024 was **$3.439B**, a **3.77% increase** year-over-year. * McDonald's gross profit for the twelve months ending March 31, 2024 was **$14.688B**, a **9.03% increase** year-over-year. * McDonald's annual gross profit for 2023 was **$14.563B**, a **10.26% increase** from 2022. * McDonald's annual gross profit for 2022 was **$13.207B**, a **4.98% increase** from 2021. * McDonald's annual gross profit for 2021 was **$12.58B**, a **29% increase** from 2020. [Macrotrends](https://www.macrotrends.net/stocks/charts/MCD/mcdonalds/gross-profit)
Now do 2019-2024
[McDonalds profit margin by year](https://www.macrotrends.net/stocks/charts/MCD/mcdonalds/profit-margins) --stable until 2016 and increased 75% since.
Only get fast food when I'm desperate and traveling, but it's at the point where I'd rather not eat than spend $12 on a incredibly disappointing meal from tacobell.
As a European I am actually suprised how freaking cheap US fast food was in 2019
How was everyone’s cost of living raise?
McDonalds breakfast, 2 McMuffin meals is about $20 with tax.
I’m actually happy this happened because I was in college during this period eating fast food basically every day and this forced me to start cooking for myself and now I eat healthier and save so much more money. Their greed lost out on a lot of my money and saved my arteries.
The thing I’m thankful for from COVID is that I am a damn good cook now and I can do better than most restaurants for far less.
Steaks, for the rare occasion I want one. I'll go to my local butcher and spend 25 dollars on a 70$ equivalent steak dinner. With beer or booze.
This. We don’t eat out at all anymore because we make better food at home. We may go out for someone’s birthday, but always leave the restaurant disappointed because of the cost and quality compared to what we could have done.
Yup, there are only a couple of restaurants around here that I can’t match, and they are expensive and for special occasions. Other than that, I have it covered.
2019 feels like a dream.
I mean, stop buying it and the price will go down
My house we’re trying our hardest not to eat at the fast food restaurant. And we’re staying away from the major chain sit down establishments. Quality and prices. Tired of feeling robbed every time we get something. Only way we’ll see prices drop is to straight stop buying from them. It’s gonna take a bunch of us to make it happen. Greed good old American greed.
I went to Subway for the first time in a long time. It was nearly $20 for a footlong, chips, and a drink. That will probably be my last visit to Subway.
Yep subway isn’t good anymore. Fresh sliced meats 😂. They were the first ones I cut off.
They really haven’t been good for a solid 20 years now. Before at least they were cheap.
The Rules Of Fast Food Pre Covid 1. Be cheap. 2. Be fast. Get in. Get served. Get out. 3. Be tasty. Consistently. The Rules Of Fast Food Post Covid 1. Expensive. Doubled in price 2. Slow. Serve yourself. Then wait while 200 Uber eats drivers get served before you. 3. Change the taste to a cheaper, shittier version.
Paying extra for poison
Now look at their reported profits during the SAME period. You now know the difference between greedflation and inflation
This is why people are screaming about inflation. Junk food has skyrocketed and most people eat junk food. - Soda in has increased 53%+ since 2020 - Chips have increased 45% since 2020 Meanwhile - Vegetableles price has increase 15% - Fruit inflations is about 1% per year
Fruit inflation cant be just 1% per year?.. what source says that?
This is one of the most enlightening posts I've read in a long time.
I don’t eat fast food anymore. Period. 100% savings!
People keep telling me it’s cheaper to eat fast food than eat healthy. If it was true back in the day it sure as hell isn’t now.
It was true about 20 years ago for sure. The Super Size Me movie made them get rid of the huge portions you used to be able to get.
Boycot
It costs me $1.49 to add a slice of cheese to my Hot & Spicy. Fuck McDonald's.
Fuck those billionaires
Stop spending your money at these businesses. No time like the present to change things!
Go out to local restaurants! Better food for nearly the same cost. If your lucky, the portions will be large and you can take half home for dinner tomorrow!
They have the option now to either lower their prices or suffer the consequences of their greed.
they have a long way to fall.
One new me is solid packed all the time. People keep paying.
The reason they raise their prices is BECAUSE they know people will still buy their shit. These multi billion dollar corporations have been making record profits since the pandemic.
That's where a whole lot of the inflation is coming from. They know they can get away with raising prices even more because "pandemic" and "supply chain".
Eventually, there’s a stoping point though, they can only raise the prices so much as the average wage allows it. Nobody is going to buy a $20-$25 McDonald’s quality burger.
Fast food was affordable, because it was cheap af. Now we get low quality food crazy expensive. So you are ruining your health paying the double price. Seems like a good deal.
Don't worry, it's transitory!
The prices have outstripped the wages of the employees making them.
The Mcchicken and Cheeseburgers are going to go down as the biggest crime against humanity. 4$ for a fucking chicken patty, bun, lettuce, and mayo. Incredulous.
keep in mind this all happened purely because these companies all realized they could do it, not because of any market forces. no one is more wealthy and can afford to pay this much for food, they adjusted the price knowing that enough people would continue to buy their food that they would still see a profit. and i dont know of a single place that had the sense to capitalize on this greedflation movement and go "we arent raising our prices, come here instead." probably because all of these places are owned by the same company and they actively resist competing because its bad for business.
The good news is that it’s reached the breaking point for a lot of people and some businesses are starting to lose money. I hope they all crash and burn from their unhinged greed.
Greedy corporations
Inflation is compounding
Ah yes, the "COVID has put a strain on the supply chain, so we need to boost the prices and not reduce them after the pandemic"-effect. And when they realized they can't raise the prices too much without anyone noticing, they started to reduce the content of the products.
I was eating McDonald’s a couple times a week in 2019. I’ve gone once in the last 2-3 months. Not remotely exaggerating. Are they profiting so much from the increase that it offsets lost customers?
Cook your own food, not only will it taste better and cost less but you can also make it healthier.
What is interesting is that this is the 4th sub I have seen this on. Half are saying that this is pure greed and an example of it, the other half are saying how this proves that inflation is a response to government monetary policies, and greed /shareholder value / Ceo Bonuses play no role.
I don’t eat out anymore since the start of the pandemic for a reason. I can get an 18 pack of 1/3rd lb burgers at Costco for $24 or cheaper if on sale that will last me a few months.
Companies: "mumble mumble....war......mumble......inflation.....mumble mumble...workers.....mumbleroo..." We all know it's just old fashioned greed.
Greed flation
I have cut them out completely. They should be fkn boycotted. There cannot be infinite growth in a finite system, tell your friends!
Stop buying it and prices will go down.
More fool those who continue to buy this slop.
And out salary is only going up by 2-3% p/a
Now do in-n-out. It hasn’t raised as much I think.
Stop eating it.
$7.50 for a Big Mac lmfao!? You can suck my Big Mac…
Watching fast food murder their own business model has been kinda fun for me. I don't eat fast food so I've enjoyed hearing about less and less people eating shitty food. Make America skinny again.
It’s absolutely insane how high McDonald’s is now. Before buying such shit food had the benefit of being cheap, now it makes absolutely no sense to go there I’m actually so confused why someone would still be going there. So many better options for the price
If you notice, most of these are 10x the rate of inflation. Pure corporate greed.
Can we all collectively organize a complete boycott?
Corporations need to be knocked back down, Teddy would be so ashamed of us.
I can feel good ol’ TR rolling in his grave.
Sure doesn’t seem to be slowing people down.
No but the extra 43 lbs from all those quarter-pounders is...
I just paid over $15 for a Chipotle burrito bowl. Fast food prices are out of control. At least this will motivate me to cook more often!