The survey includes 17,000 unique products that have been sold in many stores on January 1, 2022, and November 24, 2024.
The prices of the cheapest products have increased the most percentage-wise, says Ulf Mazur, CEO of Matpriskollen.
Matpriskollen has classified the products into groups of five kronor in the range of 0-60 kr. All products over 60 kronor form their own group – and the result is clear. The lower the price, the greater the price increase, with one exception.
The only deviation from the curve is the group between 54 and 59 kr, where there are products that have increased significantly in price, such as coffee, fish, and olive oil, for example, says Ulf Mazur.
Why does it look like this?
A 50-öre increase on a cheap product becomes more percentage-wise than on an expensive product. Moreover, it is common in pricing to round up to something that ends with 90 or 95 öre, says Mazur.
"Cheapflation"
The trend of relatively higher price increases on goods in the lower price groups is not unique to Sweden, something that, among others, Financial Times has reported on. To get a picture of how it looks in Sweden, the Social Democrats have commissioned the survey from Matpriskollen.
We have followed the issue of "cheapflation" internationally and are pleased that there is now a survey that shows it has also affected Sweden, says Mikael Damberg (S), Member of Parliament and Vice Chairman of the Finance Committee.
He believes that this has consequences and should be seen as a wake-up call for politicians.
We know that those with the smallest margins are hardest hit by inflation, but now they are being hit doubly hard due to even higher price increases on food in the cheaper product categories, he says.
Ulf Mazur is clear that Matpriskollen has not studied people's purchasing patterns.
The hypothesis is that those who do not have much money buy cheaper products, but we do not have facts on purchasing patterns. You probably need to include that piece as well to be able to draw far-reaching conclusions, says Mazur.
