I don't see anyone mentioning the proportions of the bars. For example, on the 1st item, $1 vs $2.99 is not even double the size...

Sooooo, stop eating there? It’s expensive enough bowing to the grocery cartels, who can afford to eat out?

The graph is fucked btw. Read the values its different than the bars. Also a gaph like this should set the starting point for everything on the same level and only show the change not how much it changed by. You could put a car on this graph and shiw how its price increased by 100$ which would blow out all the other data even though its price only changed by 1% for example.

What's actually infuriating are those bar charts.

At this point, you’re better off going for the lunch specials at an asian restaurant. Same price, more filling, and less unhealthy.

Stop buying shitty, overpriced food from a dumpster organization.

If you stop buying it, you'll help signal to the dumpster organization that their prices are too high.

Prices have gone up while portions, service, and even quality (as low as it already was) have gone down. When does "the free market" start improving things for customers instead of just shareholders?

were the bar lengths randomly generated? they make no sense

The two inflation calculators that I found said that a dollar in 2014 should be worth $1.33 in 2025. That’s significantly lower than the lowest price increase in this infographic.

I was just talking about this with a friend the other day, but it's really not worth it to go to these fast food places anymore even if you do like the food. I remember when, speaking to my friend, we would go to BK in high school and get a couple of "buck doubles", because Burger King used to run a promotion where you could get two double cheeseburgers for two dollars. It was honestly a great deal. Then the shrinkflation kicked in and over time the size of the food became smaller and smaller. Then, the actual currency inflation hit, and fast food companies used the increased price of beef, chicken and other such ingredients as an excuse to gouge the hell out of their prices. Now, if I were to go to BK and get my usual fare, I would be lucky to leave paying less than $16. For like, $4 extra (not including tip) I could go to the Chili's across the street and get an actual restaurant quality burger, and a side, and a beverage and be more than satisfied.

These fast food places are completely off their rocker if they think these prices are reasonable. Inflation is going down, so we as consumers need to stop buying their shit so they can't justify keeping prices so insanely high. McDonalds and other fast food places are the biggest bulk purchaser of raw ingredients, so you bet that they have an insane amount of negotiating power to convince farmers and ranchers to supply the stuff they need for below market rate in bulk quantities.

If you are really craving that unique fast food flavor that you can only get at your favorite chain, let me tell you, there are YouTube channels with copycat recipes that can be made quicker and cheaper than the time it takes to drive to the nearest chain location, order, pay, get your food, leave, and come back to your house to eat it. And they taste almost the same or better in most cases because you make it yourself so you can add as much of the flavorful stuff as you want.

And McDonald's countered with a statement Pricing Myths vs Facts where they compared 2019-2024 prices where the original study the infographic is based on compared 2014-2024 prices. A little FUD seasoning if your will to make it all look less bad.

That's the same company that countered their wages being too low to live on by producing an example budget to show how you can survive with only a McDonald's job. The first line in the budget is income from the first and second job. They costs are even more laughable today.

What I as a German take from this is fucking hell was McD in the US cheap before. O.o

I mean it inflated a lot here too, but wow.

They can surge all they like. Our family just stopped buying from them (and most fast food places).

It's not a time saver to sit in a drive thru instead of making something for meals at home.

Plenty small restaurants have not seen price increases this stark over this period of time. Eat there instead.

Is that little girl in the picture to blame?

Everyone knows that McDonald's don't degrade over time. You can put one in its original bag in the closet for a number of years without problems.

Shame on you for not buying in bulk when the price was more amenable. Get down to your local McDonald's now and buy yourself at least 57 Big Macs which I've calculated to be the optimal amount until global warming renders this planet a cinder. And get me a chocolate milkshake while you're at it, please.

It's largely because of new tiered pricing. They want to extract the maximum price while not losing any customers.

To do this, they first double or triple all their prices. Then, for those who are willing to stand on one leg, pat their head, and rub their stomach* while ordering the right things, they'll charge you half price.

(*By this I mean use their app. The main purpose of the app and the deals are to charge everyone what they're willing to pay.)

Don't eat fast food, make your own.

Fast food is supposed to be trash and cheap. It now is just trash.

Last time, I was at McDonald's, they got my order wrong, it took forever and on my way back home, I got a speeding ticket.

It would never even occur to me to eat at fast food (unless you count like the pizza by the slice place on the corner).

I just feel so alienated from everyone else sometimes. Just... The food isn't good, isn't good for you, isn't cheap, isn't fast. The org isn't environmentally or politically friendly. Just stop eating there. Be mildly inconvenienced if you have to.

But I guess that will slam right into the constant problem of "someone feels bad and now they're not going to listen"

Fast food didn't just stop being cheap, it also stopped being fast. Might not be the case for everywhere, but when they got the self-checkout screens they started making every order in order, and nothing more. Now if I order a single item, I still have to wait if there are many orders before mine. I miss the time when I could look behind the cashier and see what they had pre-made to get something immediately.

I gave up on McDonalds. I can get better food elsewhere for half the price. Their trash was ok for pushing a turd, but not for what they charge today.

Prices fit for a billionaire who wears depends

The quality has also fallen dramatically. I used to like their standard hamburgers (the little ones), but the buns are leathery these days, and the meat seems smaller than it used to be.

Just remember that the location which let the cheeto use it as a platform never got any blowback from corporate. So, just stop going to McDonald's altogether; plenty of other food places for when you don't want to cook.

More reason to stop eating fast food.

Based on the comments here, McDonalds probably made the graphic.

Everyone is more focused on how it should have been done rather then fuming at McDonalds for price gouging.

I wonder how this affects homelessness. What surprised me in my country was how much the homeless dependent on those cheap eats for food. How a 2 dollar burger here meant a meal for them, and how a price increase meant extra begging to get fed.

If this was just McDonalds, shouldn't there be a Burger King that didn't raise prices to try to gain back market share?

And if this was all fast food joints, is there a common reason besides greed that it happened? If it was just greed, you would think one of their competitors could WALMART (lower prices until competition dies) them.

McDoubles were $1 many places until 2016 or later. My standard McD meal for years was 3 McDoubles for $3. After that they raised McDoubles to closer to $2 but the McTriple was also about $2 so I switched to 2 McTriples for $4.

Now the only way to get a decent price meal is to use the app and I refuse to use the app. Now and then they’ll have a 2/$6 deal but it still feels overpriced.

To compare, inflation from 2014 to 2025 has been about 33%