Price of beef hoofing it through the roof

The price of beef is going to make a steak dinner a more expensive proposition in coming months. Image from Wikimedia Commons.

As the price of gas rises, so do the prices of many other things because the cost of getting them to customers becomes greater. The price of beef, for instance, has already started to increase in restaurants.

Beef is what is expensive for dinner

Rising crude oil prices affect far more than just the cost of filling up at the pump. Any goods that require transportation have to go up in price as well because vendors have to naturally pass some of that cost onto the consumer. It is also still not the president’s fault.

Unfortunately, one of the things that depends on the cost of transportation to determine what people will have to pay for it is food. In other words, if it costs more to ship food across the country, that means the price is going to start going up at grocery stores and restaurants. Increased food prices are already starting to manifest, according to the Daily Mail, in steakhouses in New York City.

Sympathy for the steakhouse?

Some of the Big Apple’s finest steakhouses have noted a 10 percent increase in the price of beef in recent weeks, causing prices to rise drastically for a steak dinner. Leaner, cheaper cuts can now command more than $50 each at iconic restaurants like Morton’s or Porter House New York. Granted, those are restaurants where few can afford to dine, so it may not inspire much sympathy.

It may not worry most people if the well-off have to shell out a few more bucks for steak in a very posh steakhouse, but the cost of beef is projected to go up everywhere. According to ABC, rising gas prices are projected to affect beef and chicken prices for the rest of the year.

[A steak dinner may soon require short term loans to fund]

Food prices are currently 4.4 percent up from this time last year, according to Time magazine, compared to just 2.9 percent for all consumer goods. During 2011, meat prices rose by 9 percent, though that was tame compared to price increases of coffee and peanut butter, which went up by 19 and 27 percent.

Other factors

The cost of meats like chicken and beef, according to ABC, are also going up because of lower domestic supply and greater exports because of a weaker dollar making it cheaper for importers to buy goods from the U.S.

Other consumer goods will increase in price. Because many goods other than gasoline are made from petroleum, such as petroleum jelly and laundry detergent, prices of those products will also increase. Last year, Procter and Gamble reported that the cost of laundry detergent made by the company, such as Tide, was increasing by 4.5 percent due to oil prices.

Interestingly enough, according to NPR, there have been a rash of Tide thefts nationwide in recent months. Thieves specifically steal Tide detergent and sell it for $5 to $10 per bottle.