average income is down over the last 4 years while average food price is up, are you dense? how could you say food has never been more affordable?
He's pulling from an article that compares the growth from 1913 (LOL) to now in prices and wages. It's relevancy to current generational data is like comparing the average temperature in Florida 50 years ago to the average temperature on Saturn today. But what do you expect? Liberal math is always intended to be convenient.
And I have posted food expenditure as a percent of total household expenditure for a century as well. I would think you'd be satisfied to see such a long series.
You're looking at ticks now. This is one way I can say it: http://www.elitetrader.com/vb/showthread.php?s=&postid=3889413&highlight=food#post3889413
Food as a Share of Consumerâs Budget "U.S. consumers have seen their âwell-beingâ improve substantially over the past 80 years (Figure 4) as measured by both food budget share and real disposable personal income (DPI) per capita. However, these national averages ignore any potential income distribution issues. " More>> Page 8, 9.
I did, above. <img src="http://i247.photobucket.com/albums/gg158/MDA2008/MDA%202012/EggsPriceOverTime.jpg">
Aaah, there's the rub. Include the sliver of people who's income is growing absurdly in your number, and suddenly all is affordable.
So, in your eggs example, take the price of eggs relevant to the current generation, say since 1970 or so. Overlay it with real income growth (not nominal) and then you've got a hint of where affordability is (for eggs), but even then, your real income growth is using inflation statistics provided by the BLS which was revised several times (this argument has been stated before).