Grocery prices increased by 8.5 per cent in the year up to July. That’s an easing from 9.1 per cent the previous month, but still three times the overall inflation rate.
Grocery prices increased by 8.5 per cent in the year up to July. That’s an easing from 9.1 per cent the previous month, but still three times the overall inflation rate.
This is the best summary I could come up with:
Gas prices were a major factor pushing up the inflation rate, mostly due to what economists call the base effect.
Similar attempts at price controls in the 1970s had disastrous results, but some policy experts say it’s an idea worth exploring, at least on a limited basis.
“It’s not the '70s anymore, our markets are different,” said Vass Bednar, executive director of the Master of Public Policy Program at McMaster University in Hamilton.
While Bednar says she doesn’t advocate for a heavy-handed cap on all types of food in perpetuity, she says it makes sense to look into policies that could ensure some basic necessities — baby formula, bread, certain fruits and vegetables — have at least some options that remain affordable.
“If you’re feeding a baby formula and you’re on a fixed income, we need to have to have real conversations that are tough about whether and when to intervene in marketplaces to make sure items like that are accessible to people.”
Avery Shenfeld, an economist with CIBC, said he doesn’t see the justification for price caps in Canada’s grocery business, given the trends we’re seeing beneath the surface.
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