Things whose price has barely changed in decades

In My Humble Opinion
1

As a child, we eagerly read the Sears “Christmas Wish Book” every year the moment the catalogue arrived. It started with pages of gifts for $5, $10, $20… etc. before continuing to what in retrospect were often ugly clothing and housewares, and other stuff you would expect, like $1000 calculators and VCRs.

My thrifty parents never did get around to buying a “Dröste Chocolate Initial” for $5. I saw something similar on sale at a drug store last week for $4 - and it occurred to me the price of such had barely budged. Not that I bought one. Don’t need it now; and at the time my dad usually suffered alternate cheapo gifts of Old Spice, Hai Karate cologne, or the oddly named Brut (Brute?) by Fabrégé - a phrase which I guess turned skunk water into wine.

What other things have basically stayed the same price over decades?

2

Gasoline.

3

Compact discs.

4

Costco Hot Dogs

5

Gas station bathroom condoms.

6

Arizona Iced tea still goes for .99 cents I think. It’s cheaper than bottled water.

7

Salt.

8

… and rotisserie chickens! I heard they lose money on both of these items yet refuse to raise the price for some reason.

9

Loss leader. You go in for a chicken and you leave with a cart full of other stuff.

10

Video games were $49.99 in the 90s, and then eventually became $59.99 and very rarely more. Adjusted for inflation, that means they’re actually cheaper now than before even though they cost much much more to make now.

11

Totino’s Party Pizza. It was regular priced 3/$5 in the 00s, and can still be found on sale for that price or very close to it frequently.

12

When I was in high school, if you didn’t care about the brand, you could get a pair of jeans for about $15. Last time I bought jeans, a couple of years ago, that was still the price.

13

Even cheaper than that at Costco, I think. They have several options for $10/pair.

14

Toothpaste?

15

Have you BEEN in a store lately? Toothpaste is like $9/tube.
It used to be pennies.

Here’s one: Computers.

In 1984, a Mac 128K was $2,495. In 2025, a MacBook Pro M5 is $2,599 (decked out!).

16

Meanwhile, RAM is like, what, a billion dollars now? Prices increased fivefold in just a few months: RAM price crisis LIVE — all the latest updates on price surges, global memory shortage, expert advice and more | Tom's Guide

Computers won’t be cheap much longer. AI is hogging all the new chips and there won’t be much left for everyday home users.

17

“Ten Bucks, just like down the street!”

18

Most beauty and health things have increased exorbitantly.

But aspirin. Regular old aspirin. Is cheap.

19

I have no idea how old you are, but I’m old enough to remember gasoline costing less than 30 cents a gallon. Prices didn’t increase until the oil embargo of the 70s.

Now, I will grant you that the price of gasoline, although it has gone through wild fluctuations, hasn’t greatly changed in the last 20 years.

20

This is something I ‘used’ to think about when I thought of this question. 24 packs of soda.

I remember a 24 pack of name brand soda being about $6 in the early 90s, and I remember a 24 pack of name brand soda being about $6 before covid.

Of course, since covid its now $12 for a 24 pack. But we had a good run.

I will add this. Pizza is still pretty cheap. In college I used to get a large 1 topping takeout pizza for $5-6 about 20 years ago, now you can get a large 1 topping for about the same price.

Charging someone $1.50 for a hot dog and a fountain drink in the 1980s is criminal. Isn’t a fountain drink only about $0.30 in parts (cup, straw, drink) even in today’s money? Also hot dogs aren’t that expensive, a generic pack is still under $2.

The dollar tree still sells a large tube for $1.25.