(Roughly) Daily

This summer Pret A Manger, purveyor of sandwiches to desk-workers in the white-collar cities of the West, added lobster rolls to its menu. In Britain they cost £5.99 ($7.31); in America $9.99. In both countries they are filled with lobster from Maine, along with cucumber, mayonnaise and more. Rent and labour cost about the same in London as in downtown New York or Boston. Neither sticker price includes sales tax. Yet a Pret lobster roll in America is a third pricier than in Britain, even though the lobster comes from nearer by.

This Pret price gap is not limited to lobster rolls. According to data gathered by The Economist on the dozen Pret sandwiches that are most similar in the two countries, the American ones cost on average 74% more (see chart). An egg sandwich in New York costs $4.99 to London’s £1.79, more than double. A tuna baguette costs two-thirds more. The price mismatch is intriguing—the more so for The Economist, which publishes the Big Mac index, a cross-country comparison of burger prices, which shows a 43% transatlantic disparity…

Find out “Why Americans pay more for lunch than Britons do.”

* Samuel Johnson

###

As we cogitate on the cost of comestibles, we might spare a thought for Luther Crowell; he died on this date in 1903.  A prolific inventor (he held over 280 patents), he invented and patented the first machine to manufacture accordion-sided, flat-bottomed paper bags.

(That said, Margaret E. Knight might more accurately be considered the”mother of the modern shopping bag”: she perfected square bottoms two years earlier.)

source