Aisle 1 · Consumer research
The Hot Dog Index
The warehouse club quarter-pound hot dog and soda has cost $1.50 since 1985. The price has never moved. Everything else has. Here is the gap, drawn against the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics consumer price index.
What it costs
$1.50
Unchanged since 1985
What it would cost
$4.67
If it had tracked inflation
$1.50 versus the dollar, 1985–today
- Actual combo price
- Inflation-adjusted
CPI-U, all items, US city average. Source: U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, series CUUR0000SA0. Loading.
Cumulative inflation since 1985
211%
What a 1985 dollar buys now
32¢
The gap, per combo
$3.17
Show the numbers as a table
| Year | Actual | Inflation-adjusted | Gap |
|---|
This is a joke about a hot dog and also a real chart. Both things are true.