Americans continued to eat out while filling the pantry when Covid hit
Americans flooded the supermarket when the pandemic hit in early 2020, creating well-documented spot shortages of staples. But they also patronized restaurants at a steady rate in the early weeks, according to a USDA analysis of sales data, suggesting families at first were stocking up for an uncertain future rather than actually eating at home.
Consumers blame Covid-19 for higher meat prices
In the first Consumer Food Insights survey, Americans were six times more likely to blame higher meat prices on pandemic-related shutdowns than to blame meatpackers, who the Biden administration blamed. Some 51 percent of respondents said Covid-19 shutdowns were the cause, compared to 8 percent who chose concentration and market power of meatpackers, according to the survey by the Center for Food Demand Analysis and Sustainability at Purdue University.