Inflation concerns many people not only in Germany, but also in the USA. There it is even higher. t-online compared products in both countries.
This was not necessarily expected in Germany: the inflation rate has risen again, the Federal Statistical Office announced on Wednesday in Wiesbaden. According to the first estimate, the price level will increase by 2.0 percentage points. Inflation also has an impact at the supermarket checkout, as t-online shows in its shopping cart. Read more about this here.
But it’s not just in Germany that many citizens are concerned about price developments: in the USA, where a new president will be elected next week, the high costs are one of the most important issues in the election campaign. In 2022, inflation in the United States was more than nine percent. The rate has currently fallen to 2.4 percent, but is still higher than in Germany.
But what does inflation mean at the supermarket checkout in the USA – and are the prices overall comparable to those in Germany? t-online compared selected products from our shopping cart with comparable products in a branch of the Trader Joe’s and Wholefoods supermarkets in the capital Washington, DC.
What is striking is that most of the products that t-online was able to compare were more expensive in the USA. And the cliché that bread is considered a luxury item in the country was confirmed. The biggest price difference was between a whole grain bread from the Wholefoods supermarket and a German crusty bread: While the price in Germany was 1.59 euros, the bread in Washington cost the equivalent of 8.20 euros, over 400 percent more.
However, comparably large price jumps were not noticeable for other products. However, a pack of sugar was more than twice as expensive (1.89 to 4.10 euros in the USA), three mixed peppers (1.49 to 3.70 in the USA) or a salami frozen pizza: while the pizza was in Germany currently costs 1.99, the price at Trader Joe’s was the equivalent of 4.10 euros.
Butter from the Kerrygold brand was also 50 percent more expensive. The price difference for two kilos of potatoes and a net of onions was around 40 percent. However, there was hardly any price difference for wheat flour, a can of tomato cream soup or Pink Lady apples.
A few products, however, are cheaper: Trader Joe’s own-brand cheese spread costs almost 30 percent less compared to a Philadelphia spread. Tomatoes were also more than 25 percent cheaper (two euros in the USA to 2.69 in Germany). Spaghetti and fusilli were around 28 percent cheaper in Washington than in Berlin.
In our test, the US shopping cart was significantly more expensive overall than the one in Germany: While shopping in Berlin cost around 62 euros, the price in the USA was almost 81 euros, around 30 percent higher.
In fact, you would have to dig even deeper into your pockets to buy in the USA: For comparability, the sizes of the American products in our calculations were adjusted to those of the German products. In the vast majority of cases, US products were available commercially in larger quantities and therefore at higher prices than in Germany.
For the survey: t-online first recorded current prices for various products in a Rewe branch in Berlin on October 30th. The prices were then compared with comparable products from the ranges of the supermarket chains Trader Joe’s and Wholefoods. In order to be able to compare the prices better, the price of the US products was converted to the size of the German comparison products.
