# Things whose price has barely changed in decades **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [December 21, 2025, 8:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/things-whose-price-has-barely-changed-in-decades/1025921 "2025-12-21T20:17:45Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![kaylasdad99](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kaylasdad99/32/3398_2.png) [@kaylasdad99](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kaylasdad99)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2025, 7:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/things-whose-price-has-barely-changed-in-decades/1025921/61 "2025-12-22T19:26:43Z")
> [@Reply](#): > > > [@Wesley\_Clark](#): > > > > Pizza is still pretty cheap. > > A Costco large 1-topping is still like $10, but what gets me is like the 3-4 topping combos at small neighborhood joints. Those seem to be in the like $30 to $40 range now, which is crazy for some bread and cheese and sauce with like half a cup of toppings. > > Was “real” pizza always that expensive, or is this a recent ish thing? My feeling (so please don’t take this as empirical) is that ordering pizza by the topping has always been a good way to break the pizza budget. You want to stick with the posted combos or the flyer specials that let you choose a particular number of toppings. I note that Costco no longer has the $10 Supreme Pizza that was available up through 2019. ---
**Author:** ![Wesley\_Clark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wesley_clark/32/20581_2.png) [@Wesley\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wesley_Clark)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2025, 7:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/things-whose-price-has-barely-changed-in-decades/1025921/62 "2025-12-22T19:35:35Z")
> [@kaylasdad99](#): > > My feeling (so please don’t take this as empirical) is that ordering pizza by the topping has always been a good way to break the pizza budget. You want to stick with the posted combos or the flyer specials that let you choose a particular number of toppings. Thats true in my experience, but even with that places like Dominos or papa johns have specialty pizzas for $10, so if you want something with 5 toppings you can get it that way. Also sams club has a 16", 4 meat pizza for $9. I thought of something else that hasn’t gone up in price, alcohol. 20 years ago I used to buy a 1.75L handle of cheap vodka or cheap whiskey for about $12. Now in 2025 its about the same price. ---
**Author:** ![hajario](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hajario/32/171_2.png) [@hajario](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hajario)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2025, 7:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/things-whose-price-has-barely-changed-in-decades/1025921/63 "2025-12-22T19:36:26Z")
This is definitely true in general. Sandwich places are often similar. There’s high margin on an extra slice of cheese. ---
**Author:** ![Eyebrows\_0f\_Doom](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/eyebrows_0f_doom/32/3119_2.png) [@Eyebrows\_0f\_Doom](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eyebrows_0f_Doom)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2025, 7:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/things-whose-price-has-barely-changed-in-decades/1025921/64 "2025-12-22T19:43:45Z")
> [@Mighty\_Mouse](#): > > The menu prices have, but the prices in the app are often much lower. I rarely pay “list price” for anything at McDonald’s or Wendy’s these days. In 2019 I almost always did. The prices in the app are identical. Do you mean if you use a deal? Well, duh a deal is cheaper than without a deal. And even with that, it’s only a few select items that have deals listed. Prices have absolutely increased 2X or more. A regular cheeseburger is now $3.49. It used to be $1 maybe 10 years ago. I just found a digital receipt from May 2020 when a cheeseburger was $1.99. ---
**Author:** ![Mighty\_Mouse](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mighty_mouse/32/7776_2.png) [@Mighty\_Mouse](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mighty_Mouse)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2025, 8:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/things-whose-price-has-barely-changed-in-decades/1025921/65 "2025-12-22T20:01:49Z")
> [@Eyebrows\_0f\_Doom](#): > > Prices have absolutely increased 2X or more. A regular cheeseburger is now $3.49. It used to be $1 maybe 10 years ago. I’m not talking about ten years ago. I’m talking about from 2019 to 2025. Maybe it’s because where I live minimum wage had risen from 8.25 to 12 or more BEFORE 2019, so the $5 extra value meal everyone talks about didn’t exist in 2019 either. In my McDonald’s app I see a $3 off $15 deal every single day. In Wendy’s I see a $2 off Breakfast combo and $2 off premium combo every single day (sometimes $3). Been that way for at least two years. I can also get free fries with a sandwich purchase, every day at McDonald’s in the app. And free medium fries with a $1.29 drink. So the $3.99 price of medium fries is purely notional to me. I mean I could order a $12.99 Big Mac meal. Or I could order a Big Mac, a medium coke and a medium fries for $9.19 (this is what I am seeing in the app right now). And I can do this combo with any sandwich or chicken tenders. Every day of the year, but only once per day. You have to work for it, but that’s exactly the purpose of these complicated pricing schemes. ---
**Author:** ![Eyebrows\_0f\_Doom](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/eyebrows_0f_doom/32/3119_2.png) [@Eyebrows\_0f\_Doom](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eyebrows_0f_Doom)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2025, 8:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/things-whose-price-has-barely-changed-in-decades/1025921/66 "2025-12-22T20:06:59Z")
> [@Mighty\_Mouse](#): > > In my McDonald’s app I see a $3 off $15 deal every single day. In Wendy’s I see a $2 off Breakfast combo and $2 off premium combo every single day (sometimes $3). Been that way for at least two years. Those deals are targeted to you. They are not app-wide. ---
**Author:** ![Mighty\_Mouse](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mighty_mouse/32/7776_2.png) [@Mighty\_Mouse](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mighty_Mouse)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2025, 8:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/things-whose-price-has-barely-changed-in-decades/1025921/67 "2025-12-22T20:07:11Z")
> [@LSLGuy](#): > > Yep. I thought it particularly apt that you were the person to bring up this example, but it was one you encountered as a consumer, rather than your usual C-suite cartoon villain persona. 😉 Should I feel insulted? I think I try to balance my insight from working in corporate finance and analytics with my experience as a consumer and as a citizen. And it is definitely career limiting because I will not drink the kool-aid. I refuse to participate in the rant that all regulation is bad, employees are the enemy and consumer advocates are hypocrites at best and tools of some nebulous conspiracy at worst. ---
**Author:** ![Mighty\_Mouse](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mighty_mouse/32/7776_2.png) [@Mighty\_Mouse](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mighty_Mouse)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2025, 8:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/things-whose-price-has-barely-changed-in-decades/1025921/68 "2025-12-22T20:08:14Z")
They are targeted at me because I’m a cheapskate. That’s exactly the point. I mean I participate in the evaluation of these kind of offers for my employer’s “loyalty” program. I have some idea of the logic being used. ---
**Author:** ![Reply](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/reply/32/15952_2.png) [@Reply](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Reply)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2025, 8:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/things-whose-price-has-barely-changed-in-decades/1025921/69 "2025-12-22T20:12:27Z")
> [@Mighty\_Mouse](#): > > You have to work for it, but that’s exactly the purpose of these complicated pricing schemes. Yeesh, that’s really annoying. The effect an app like that would have on me isn’t so much “ooh, look at the deals!”, more like “I’m not going to jump through hoops and play your stupid games for this crappy food, bye”. Presumably I’m not the target market. Even more upscale establishments like Starbucks played similar games with their app, while their regular drinks became less and less affordable (not that they were ever cheap to begin with). I hate this personalized, algorithmic future ☹ ---
**Author:** ![Mighty\_Mouse](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mighty_mouse/32/7776_2.png) [@Mighty\_Mouse](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mighty_Mouse)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2025, 8:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/things-whose-price-has-barely-changed-in-decades/1025921/70 "2025-12-22T20:12:28Z")
Too late to edit, but I want to be clear that my first question was tongue in cheek. ---
**Author:** ![Mighty\_Mouse](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mighty_mouse/32/7776_2.png) [@Mighty\_Mouse](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mighty_Mouse)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2025, 8:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/things-whose-price-has-barely-changed-in-decades/1025921/71 "2025-12-22T20:15:38Z")
> [@Reply](#): > > I hate this personalized, algorithmic future Absolutely. So do I. I think this move toward price discrimination reduces consumer welfare (in economics it shifts some of the gains of trade from buyer to seller). A lot of efficiency arguments for the “free market” break down when you have multiple prices for the same goods. ---
**Author:** ![Mk\_VII](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/5f9b8f/32.png) [@Mk\_VII](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mk_VII)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2025, 8:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/things-whose-price-has-barely-changed-in-decades/1025921/72 "2025-12-22T20:17:47Z")
Vernier calipers. Price hasn’t changed much in forty years. Back then you bought them in installments through your employer. Also they were probably made in the West. Now they are made in China. ---
**Author:** ![Mighty\_Mouse](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mighty_mouse/32/7776_2.png) [@Mighty\_Mouse](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mighty_Mouse)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2025, 8:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/things-whose-price-has-barely-changed-in-decades/1025921/73 "2025-12-22T20:25:32Z")
I was in a conversation yesterday at a holiday event where some PhDs in Materials Science and Biomedical Engineering were talking about how 3D printing of prosthetics is crashing the cost. Something no one thought was possible as little as five years ago. ---
**Author:** ![Eyebrows\_0f\_Doom](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/eyebrows_0f_doom/32/3119_2.png) [@Eyebrows\_0f\_Doom](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eyebrows_0f_Doom)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2025, 8:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/things-whose-price-has-barely-changed-in-decades/1025921/74 "2025-12-22T20:26:42Z")
> [@Mighty\_Mouse](#): > > They are targeted at me because I’m a cheapskate. That’s exactly the point. I don’t see how _you_ getting personalized deals is at all relevant to this thread asking what prices have remained the same for decades. McDonald’s does not fit the question as their prices _have_ increased a ton. ---
**Author:** ![Mighty\_Mouse](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mighty_mouse/32/7776_2.png) [@Mighty\_Mouse](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mighty_Mouse)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2025, 8:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/things-whose-price-has-barely-changed-in-decades/1025921/75 "2025-12-22T20:41:39Z")
Yes, I seem to have lost the plot. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2025, 8:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/things-whose-price-has-barely-changed-in-decades/1025921/76 "2025-12-22T20:54:06Z")
> [@Odesio](#): > > Taco Bell has gotten a lot more expensive than it used to be. > > Item 2000 2025 > > Mexican Pizza $2.50 $5.00 > > Taco $.79 $1.99 > > Bean Burrito $.99 $2.49 > > According to the CPI inflation calculator, $1 in 2020 has the same purchasing power as $1.92 today, so the price increase at Taco Bell exceeds inflation. And yet, it’s so much worse at all of the other fast food places. Taco Bell and Wendy’s are the only ones that have a real value menu any more. > [@LSLGuy](#): > > The thing that annoys me is the “jump through a hoop and get a discount”. Where it seems the real goal isn’t data gathering, or margin maximization, but just getting the consumer to jump through a hoop on command. Good dog! Have a treat. “Jump through a hoop and get a discount” is how margin maximization almost always works. It’s just different hoops nowadays. Plus, of course, all of the valuable data they get for free from their hoops. ---
**Author:** ![Jophiel](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jophiel/32/66_2.png) [@Jophiel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jophiel)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2025, 11:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/things-whose-price-has-barely-changed-in-decades/1025921/77 "2025-12-22T23:52:03Z")
Aspirin talk reminded me that around twenty years ago, I was mildly surprised that hydrogen peroxide was about a buck a bottle. These days, it’s about a buck a bottle. I guess maybe the bottles are smaller bit even a 32oz bottle is $1.50 ---
**Author:** ![pulykamell](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pulykamell/32/3166_2.png) [@pulykamell](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pulykamell)\ **Post date:** [December 23, 2025, 12:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/things-whose-price-has-barely-changed-in-decades/1025921/78 "2025-12-23T00:22:49Z")
> [@Railer13](#): > > 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. Yeah, but that 30 cents back in 1971 is about $2.50 today. So, yes, lower than right now, where it’s $2.85 or $3 a gallon (depending on your source) in the US on average, but a couple weeks ago I was able to get gas at $2.85 at one of the more expensive places in the US to get gas (Chicago). A Doper last week reported $2.20/gal in Tennessee. So it’s pretty similar. Or are we talking nominal prices? Because that’s not a useful comparison, in my opinion. Yes, I remember in the 90s everything being half the price of today, but my $7/hr coffee house job would be a $15/hr coffeehouse job today. ---
**Author:** ![Railer13](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/railer13/32/9742_2.png) [@Railer13](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Railer13)\ **Post date:** [December 23, 2025, 12:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/things-whose-price-has-barely-changed-in-decades/1025921/79 "2025-12-23T00:26:45Z")
> [@pulykamell](#): > > Or are we talking nominal prices? Read the OP, and read through the thread. That is exactly what we’re discussing. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [December 23, 2025, 12:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/things-whose-price-has-barely-changed-in-decades/1025921/80 "2025-12-23T00:44:32Z")
Right, most things stay about the same price in inflation-adjusted dollars. That’s what inflation-adjusted means: If that weren’t true, then you’re using the wrong adjustment. There’s nothing notable about that. But despite inflation, some things manage to still retain the same nominal price. That’s interesting. That’s what this thread is about. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/things-whose-price-has-barely-changed-in-decades/1025921.md?page=3) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/things-whose-price-has-barely-changed-in-decades/1025921.md?page=5)