Food Prices

I was watching the NBC nightly news podcast this afternoon when they mentioned the price of food going up. So I decided to take a look at prices online from one of the stores I used to shop at in Vegas, and compare to what I spend here in Tokyo. Though the current exchange rate is somewhere around 108 yen to the dollar, I’ll use 100 yen to a dollar for simplicity’s sake.

Item: Vegas Price, Tokyo Price
• Eggs: $4.49 (12), $1.89 (10) or $0.37/egg, $0.19/egg
• Milk: $3.19 (.5 gal), $1.60 (1 litre) or $6.38/gal, $6.06/gal
• Bread: $2.00 (20 slices), $0.99 (8 slices) or $0.10/slice, $0.12/slice
• Yellow Bell Peppers: $2.00 ea, $0.75 ea

And it continues on in this manner with meats and veggies etc. For instance, I buy packages of 2 large chicken breasts for around $3.15. I’m shocked. When I came to Japan, I felt like everything was so expensive. Have prices gone up that much in the States in the last 6 months? Or was my initial perception of prices in Japan just misguided?