Spain's grocery basket up 36% a year, according to a widely shared calculation

A widely shared calculation claims the grocery basket is rising 36% a year and that CPI doesn't capture it

Food prices have accumulated a 36% year-on-year increase, according to a calculation shared on a forum, and the basic basket now eats up a share of the family budget that would have seemed unthinkable two years ago. Average monthly spending on food is around 440 euros per family, according to the sources cited in that same calculation. Applying that rate of increase, in three years the bill would exceed 1,100 euros; in five, 2,000; in a decade, 9,300. The arithmetic is not alarmism: it is compound interest applied to the fridge, according to those who defend that projection.

The problem is not only that everything costs more. It is that the index that officially measures that increase, the CPI, does not quite match what each shopper sees on the receipt, according to several participants in the debate. And that is where a debate begins that goes far beyond the price of chicken.

The calculation that doesn't add up with the weekly shop

The first sustancia ilegal appears in the methodology. The CPI is built with a weighted basket of goods and services, revised periodically. That weighting decides how much each item weighs in the final number. If housing, transport or certain basic foods weigh less than they do in a family's real life, the result falls short.

Some argue that the basket has been adjusted so that the figure does not spiral. It is not a marginal theory: in economic analysis there is the idea that those elements that were rising most, such as housing, have been removed from the calculation so that the index would not break the 2% target required by European treaties. The practical consequence is that the CPI serves to raise pensions and public wages, but not to deflate income tax (IRPF), so the taxpayer pays taxes on an inflation that the index itself minimises.

The result is a gap between the statistics and the supermarket till. And that gap has a name: silent loss of purchasing power.

Why is food rising so much if the CPI says otherwise?

Because the CPI measures a weighted average, not anyone's specific shopping. Each family has its own index: someone who devotes 30% of their budget to food notices a 36% rise in food much more than someone who devotes only 10%. And in Spain, with wages frozen or growing below prices, that effect is multiplied.

The calculation circulating among analysts is that the real devaluation of money could be between 11% and 13% a year if the loss of purchasing power of money is added to official inflation. That is, money is worth less than the index says, and citizens notice it with every purchase.

The most affected products are basics: oil, eggs, meat, dairy, fruit and vegetables. And they are not only rising: in some cases, quality drops to keep the price. Less product, worse raw material, same packaging. The consumer pays more for less.

Spending is cut from the bottom: fewer breakfasts at the bar and more clearance offers

The consumer's response is textbook: when the budget doesn't stretch, non-essentials are cut. Breakfasts out are dropped, treats are eliminated, own-brand products are bought and bargains are hunted. In some supermarkets, products discounted for nearing their expiry date, the ones nobody used to look at, now fly off the shelves. Demand for cheap goods has grown so much that the market itself has changed behaviour.

The problem is that this adjustment is not sustainable indefinitely. There is a floor: you cannot stop eating. And when the price of basics rises faster than wages, the only way out is to eat worse. Less protein, more carbohydrates. More pasta, less fish. The diet becomes poorer, and with it public health in the medium term.

Rent adds pressure on the same paycheque. In many provincial capitals and metropolitan areas, a rent already eats up an entire salary. The sum of housing and food leaves the family margin at zero.

What can be done? From price controls to revising the CPI

The proposals circulating range from the immediate to the structural. Cutting taxes on food, revising income tax (IRPF) brackets to compensate for inflation, deflating public tariffs. At the other extreme, some call for price intervention or limiting commercial margins, a measure that in practice tends to generate shortages.

The most cited option is revising the CPI. If the index does not reflect real inflation, everything indexed to it (pensions, public wages, contracts) falls behind. And if it is also not used to deflate income tax, the State collects more without raising rates. It is a silent tax.

The underlying debate is whether the problem is the statistics or the economic policy that uses them. Changing the CPI does not make food cheaper. But recognising that real inflation is higher forces measures to be taken that are not being taken today.

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With these differentials, pressure on consumption should moderate prices. It is not doing so. And meanwhile, every family continues to make its own CPI, the only one that matters to them, with the mobile calculator in hand.